884 
BXKD-LIFE. 
inasmuch as it possesses true feathers, and real wings 
furnished with quill-feathers, and wing-coverts, &c., but 
which, though of stunted growth, do not degenerate into 
actual fins, as with the Penguin, though they serve the 
same purpose. The rest, also, of the plumage of the 
Great Auk consists of true feathers, laid compactly and 
closely together, and not of the feather-like scales, with 
which the body of the Penguin is covered. Thus our 
bird belongs rightly to the Auks, though it may well 
claim cousinship with the Penguin. 
This Auk is a bird of considerable size, measuring 
six-and-twenty inches long, of which only three are 
allotted to its stiff tail. Of the breadth of the bird there 
is little to say, each of its fin-like wings measuring 
eleven inches in length. The beak is very large and 
strong, while the feet act as powerful sculls. The Auk 
is black on the upper parts, and white on the lower; 
the upper portion of the neck is brownish, and there are 
two white spots on either side of the forehead. With 
these words we -may consider the exterior of this 
curious creature to be fully described; of its habits 
of life but little is known. 
The Great Auk is just as much a child of the ocean 
as the Stormy Petrel, though, as far as regards any 
other resemblance, the two birds are as far as the poles 
asunder; for the Petrel is a bird in every sense of the 
word, while the Great Auk is but a miserable link between 
fish and fowl; the first is free, and able to lord it over the 
billows, while the second is but a slave of the sea. 
The home of this immature bird may be considered to 
lie between 60° to 80° of north latitude: thus Iceland 
and Greenland are stated to be the principal localities 
where it lives; whereas at Spitzbergen, as well as on the 
