164 
PROCELLARIA PELAGICA. 
prefer the neighbourhood of the coast for the purpo*^ 
of breeding. They retire sontluvard early in autuW"- 
GENUS LXIV. —PnOCULLARIA, Linnj;iis. 
253. I’JtOCKLLJRJA PBLAGICAj LINNAEUS. 
STORMY PETREL. 
WILSON", PLATE LX. FIG. VI. EDINBFRGH COLLEGE MUSEUM' 
There are few persons who have crossed the Atlaoh^’ 
or traversed ranch of the ocean, who have not ohser'f 
these solitary wanderers of the deep, skimming alo"? 
the surface of the wild and wasteful ocean, flitting P''*' 
the vessel like swallows, or following in her wak^ 
gleaning their scanty pittance of food from the roij? 
and whirling surges. Habited in mourning, and maki'v 
their appearance generally in greater numbers previo*'’ 
to or duriug a storm, they have long been fearfmj-, 
regarded by the ignorant and superstitious, not oDv 
as the foreboding messengers of tempests and dang*’’! 
to the hapless mariner, but as wicked agents, connect^" 
somehow or other, in creating them. “ Nobody,” 
they, “ can tell any thing of where they come fr®‘J' 
or how they breed, though, as sailors sometimes 
it is supposed that they hatch their eggs under tkf*_ 
wings as they sit on the water.” This mysterious 
certainty of their origin, and the circumstances abo^ 
recited, have doubtless given rise to the opinion ; 
prevalent among this class of men, that they ' 
some way or other connected with that personage . 
has been styled the Prince of the Power of the 
In every country where they are knoivn, their nann^_ 
have borne some afliuity to this belief. They h‘’! 
been called witches,* stormy petrels, the devil’s k't 
Mother Carey’s chickens, f probably from some cc ^ 
brated ideal hag of that name ; and their unexpeth 
* Arctic Zodiogy, p. 464. jrt 
■j' This name seems to have been originally given them by nj. 
Carteret’s sailoi's, who met with these birds on the coast ol ^ ^ 
See Hawkeswoutu’s Voyages, vol. i, p. 203. 
