416 
THE STORMY PETREL. 
only of which are well known to ns, as frequenters of our 
shores : the Fulmar, which is nearly as large as a Gull, and 
the Stormy Petrel, better known to sailors by the name of 
Mother Carey’s Chickens, about the size of, and in appear- 
ance not unlike, the Swift, or largest Swallow. Their whole 
bodies seem to he filled and impregnated with oil to such a 
degree, that in some of the most remote islands of the 
Hebrides the inhabitants actually form them into candles, 
by merely passing a rush through the body and out at the 
beak, which is found to burn as well as if dipped in tallow 
or any other grease. So full are they of this oil, that the 
Fulmar uses it as a weapon of defence, and when taken 
will squirt over the person who handles it a strong jet 
of pure oily liquid. When shot, if it falls into the sea, a 
partial calm is created by the quantity ejected from its 
mouth. 
With their quantity of down, which supplies the islanders 
with warm bedding, — and fat, which is considered an effica- 
cious remedy for wounds ; as is their oil, which is preserved 
in large bunches of long bladders, made of the gorge or 
stomach of the Solan Geese ; — these birds become more 
valuable to the inhabitants than the poultry tribe to us. 
The poor people of St. Kilda, in a word, prize them so highly 
that it is proverbial with them to say, “ Deprive us of the 
Petrel and Fulmar, and St. Kilda is no more.” 
They build, like most other sea-birds, in holes and chinks 
of rocks, or on the ledges of precipices ; though upon Norfolk 
island, in Australia, a species has been discovered which bur- 
rows in sand like rabbits, lying hid in the holes by day, and 
sallying forth in the evening in quest of food. Their reason 
for concealing themselves appears to be well founded ; for no 
doubt this is the same species met with in the other remote 
islands of the Southern Indian Seas, spoken of # as living in 
perpetual dread of another of its own genus, the great Black 
Petrel ( JProcellaria equinoctialis ); and well it may, for its 
sable enemies are incessantly looking out for its heart and 
* Macartney’s Voyage , vol. i. 
