Irish Sea.
Queenstown to Liverpool
1909
Aug. 4 [August 4, 1909]
(No 3)
glistening white lower parts. The rythmic [rhythmic] upward and downward
and lateral pulsating swings were exquisitely beautiful & graceful.
From six to eight of them were often performed in succession
immediately after the preliminary wing strokes and while the long
exceedingly narrow wings were held apparently quite rigid. This
seemed to be the birds' usual manner of flight but it
was not invariably adopted for I repeatedly saw one of these
Shearwaters skimming over the sea in a nearly straight 
& level course, alternately flapping & gliding.
  There were a few terns flying about over the water &
then together on a floating block of wood which bobbed & turned
in the white capped waves.
  About ten A.M. a Curlew (N. arquata) passed us
within 100 yards flying eastward. My English friend, Mr. Meeson,
saw it and assured me it was the true Curlew & not a 
Whimbrel. It looked as big as our Sickle-bill.
  About the middle of the afternoon I saw the first 
British butterfly a smallish brown-orange one that came
low over the steerage deck. No land could be seen at
this time.
  In connection with what I have just said about the
Manx Shearwaters I should have noted that I now know
that the bird I saw out in the ocean on August 2nd
was not P. anglorum. Although of about the right size
for that species it was much too light colored above &
its flight in no way closely resembled that of any of
the numerous birds observed today. What it really was
I am now at a loss to conjecture.
  I am thrilled by the beauty of the Irish Sea. Such a
wonderful deep, rich green I have never seen in any other wake before.