" a^SAR " AND THE RAT. 



115 



must have been a most extraordinary and surprising 

 apparition. 



On the voyage home, and indeed from almost the first 

 moment of their arrival on board the yacht, both rats 

 made themselves thoroughly at home, and became great 

 pets with the sailors. They were allowed to run about on 

 deck, and would crawl over any one who happened to be 

 lying down on the deck, without a suspicion of danger 

 or fear. They both drank milk with avidity, and ate any 

 form of vegetable or fruit that was offered them ; things 

 which must have been uncommonly tasty after the 

 deadly monotony of the diet they had been limited to on 

 their little island. Unfortunately one of the rats died 

 on its way home, and the other soon after its arrival in 

 the Zoological Gardens in Regent's Park. 



Little Swan Island simply swarms with iguanas, and 

 like everything else, they were remarkably unsuspicious. 

 One of them, about five feet from snout to tip of tail, 

 was obliging enough to sit for its photograph in the most 

 imperturbable manner ; although three of us had suddenly 

 stumbled upon it as it was taking a siesta on a slab of 

 rock. 



It was almost comical to see the way in which some 

 young, nearly full-grown gannets (Sula sula), were 

 apparently fraternising with, or at least had got mixed 

 up with, some iguanas which swarmed along the tops 

 of the cliffs on the south side of the island. It was here 

 that we came across a veritable happy family made up 

 of iguanas and two species of gannet, viz., the red-footed 

 gannet {Sula piscator) and the common booby {S. sula). 

 There were old birds, down-covered nesthngs, half-grown 

 young, and practically f ull-grown young, which were just 

 learning to fly ; while in many nests the adults were still 

 busy incubating their eggs. 



The red-footed gannets kept pretty well to themselves, 

 and were nesting in some very large sea-grape bushes ; 

 while the boobies shared with the iguanas a rough and 

 rocky strip of ground, which extended between the edge 



