it,” as he pulled out a peaocies: chick: brown bird with 
an irregular white spot showing both on its upper and lower 
surface, near the base of its tail. This was the owner of the | 
egg, a bird about eight inches long, resembling in wings and — 
figure, our swallows but larger, but the Petrel has a very _ 
different kind of a nose, with the nostrils opening through 
horny tubes attached to. the sides of the bill. | - 
As they tried to get a photograph of this Petrel held on 
Mary’s hand, with a long-legged infant gull also, it 
proceeded to show its unpleasant, special form of defense by 
ejecting an evil-smelling fluid from or about its nostrils, 
some of which, remaining on her skirt, reminded them of 
the picture she had made for several days. 
Mr. Howieattle had, in the meantime, also been digeine 
in the vegetable mould and now he brought out and put into 
Mary’s other hand a chunky, downy, black, halfgrown 
Tufted Puffin, resembling a huge black powder puff, and 
a moment later he pulled out a protesting parent Puffin 
from his furrow. These birds are sometimes called “Sea — 
_ Parrots,” but they resemble the Southerner little except in 
the size of their huge beaks and in their villainous tempers, 
when annoyed. In spite of the heavy gloves loaned by the 
inspector, the vicious snap of the captive left its imprint on 
fingers, trying to pose it for a portrait, for several days. 
When this bird has dashed by on the lower Columbia or 
on the waters of Puget Sound, the only impression left by 
its low, direct flight has been a narrow, black oblong with a | 
-_white streak near the front end, but, in hand, what a queer, 
fantastic creature it became! It was almost the size, and 
about the color of a crow, but its odd, sawed-off tail. was 
only one-half as long as that of that common acquaintance; | 
its high, compressed beak, its scarlet eye ring, and its ver- 
_ milion feet gave touches of the barbaric splendor of a 
tropical bird. Its white face was made ludicrous by a huge, 
scarlet bill, two-thirds as high as it was long, and a pair of 
soft, creamy-white plumes, like exaggerated eyebrows, 
Bh a 
