hing
numbers. It is known that these birds make burrows in the ground like
rabbits; that they lay one or two enormous eggs in the holes and bring up
their young there. In the evening they come in from the sea, having their
stomachs filled with a gelatinous substance gathered from the waves, and
this they eject into the throats of their offspring, or retain for their
own nourishment, according to circumstances. A little after sunset the
air at Preservation Island used to be darkened with their numbers, and it
was generally an hour before their squabbling ceased and every one had
found its own retreat. The people of the Sydney Cove had a strong example
of perseverance in these birds. The tents were pitched close to a piece
of ground full of their burrows, many of which were necessarily filled up
from walking constantly over them; yet notwithstanding this interruption
and the thousands of birds destroyed (for they constituted a great part
of their food during more than six months), the returning flights
continued to be as numerous as before; and there was scarcely a burrow
less except in the places actually covered by the tents. These birds are
about the size of a pigeon, and when skinned and smoked we thought them
passable food. Any quantity could be procured by sending people on shore
in the evening. The sole process was to thrust in the arm up to the
shoulder and seize them briskly; but there was some danger of grasping a
snake at the bottom of the burrow instead of a petrel."

The remark that the egg of the sooty petrel is of enormous size is of
course only true relatively to the size of the bird. The egg is about as
large as a duck's egg, but longer and tapering more sharply at one end.
For the rest the description is an excellent one. The wings of the bird
are of great length and strength, giving to it wonderful speed and power
of flight. The colour is coal-black. Flinders saw more of the
sooty-petrel on his subsequent voyage round Tasmania; and it will be
convenient to quote here the passage in which he refers to the prodigious
numbers in which the birds were seen. It may be added that, despite a
century of slaughter by mankind, and after the taking of millions of
eggs--which are good food--the numbers of the mutton-birds are still
incalculably great.* (* The author may refer to a paper of his own, "The
Mutton Birds of Bass Strait," in the Field, April 18, 1903, for a study
of the sooty petrel during the laying seaso