BIOLOGY 



It is marvellous how fully instinct makes these birds 

 independent. The parents do not take them to the water 

 and teach them to swim. They haven't even the example 

 of the old birds, which stay behind to moult. At an early 

 age they become independent of their own parents, and 

 earn their living by hunting any old bird they find. 

 Though they have spent their lives on land, and only 

 know that food is something found in an old bird's throat, 

 when the time comes they leave the land and plunge 

 boldly into the sea, untaught, to get their hving by strain- 

 ing Crustacea out of the water in the same way as the 

 whale does. 



Some of our party reported that they saw penguins 

 teaching the young to swim, but if this ever happens it is 

 not general. Time and again the young have been 

 watched leaving as described, entirely of their own accord. 

 At that season nearly all the old birds are in the moult 

 and never venture into the water. 



Like the Emperor the Adelie is fond of travelling 

 when family cares are off his mind. The great blizzard 

 which wiped out half the rookery left hundreds of old 

 • birds free. They began to explore the adjacent country 

 in bands. The round of the lakes was a favourite trip 

 and broad beaten roads marked this route. Tracks also 

 led to the summits of some of the hills, though the short- 

 sighted Adelie could hardly go there for the view. 



There was no general trek southwards, such as the 

 Emperors made, yet the Southern Party found tracks of 

 two at a distance of some eighty miles from the sea. 



Nebuchadnezzar and Nicodemus 



These names dignified two penguin chicks. While 

 chaos reigned in the rookery I found them exhausted and 



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