Jan., 19o4[ THE CONDOR the edge of a small pond or lagoon the teal would swim up within a few feet, the males uttering their soft we-u we-u as they jealously guarded their mates from the advances of a rival. I have made no mention of the shearwaters, penguins, gulls, terns, or oyster- catchers but all of these are tame and I have pictures of each in their favorite atti- tudes. The petrels, even, that nest on one of the islands seem not to have the usual fear of their kind for they fly about and enter their nests by day as well as by night. To stand on a high cliff above the ocean and watch a great flock of pet- rels darting about you like a swarm of bees, with the pungent smell of their oil in the nostrils, and the ?nuffied tuc, tuc, tucoo, tucoo of many shear?vaters rising out o! the cracks in the lava underfoot, while beautiful gulls and harsh-voiced boobies and frigate birds join in resenting your intrusion upon a spot where man never stood before, is a pleasure that more than offsets the scratches received in getting there. And the albatrosses! What fun it was to watch them at their pecu- liar fencing exercise. To see a big albatross walk up to another big fellow with all the swagger of a Bowery tough and bow to him as ceremoniously and gravely as a prime minister could, and then to see them fence with their bills as rapidly as do swordsmen with light rapiers, is a sight I will never forget. Nor will I soon forget the old rascal, who came for me on the dead run and who, if I had not luckily cracked him on the head with the butt of my collecting pistol, would have lunged his powerful beak half way through me. An odd fact about the al- batrosses is the direction of their flight from the island. They fly straight out to RIrO-BILLEO TROPIC BIRD ANO NEST the southward and none are seen about the north side of the island nor about any ot the other islands. We were on the island two days before we found them tho the island is not more than four miles across and there were hundreds of the birds. There are numerous other things to amuse and interest the visitor to this iso- lated group of islands. From the little fiddler crabs that suddenly disappear be- fore one's eyes on the beach to the flaming volcano that as suddenly appears on the mountain top, there is something to observe continually. Tho I have been there three times, I hope to make yet another trip to those isles where the turtle sleeps unmolested on the beach, and the bark of a seal or the weird cry of a far- away penguin are the last sounds of the night one hears as he drops into grateful slumber. Lat. 19 2 4' N., Long. 116 i2 t W., July lO, 19o3.
