was all that remained of the
sealing schooner, 'Jessie Nichol', which had been wrecked on December
21, 1910. Three men were drowned, their bodies being interred among the
tussock, each marked by a life belt and a small board on which the name
was roughly carved.

On our homeward trip we caught some wekas for the pot and duly arrived
at the Shack, tired, wet and hungry.

Next day, while sitting in the Shack reducing records, I heard a yell
from Hamilton to the effect that the 'Rachel Cohen' was in sight, and
about an hour later she dropped anchor in North-East Bay.

The sea was fairly smooth and no time was lost in bringing a boat ashore
with the mails, of which each man received a share. A gang of sealers
was landed with a view to obtaining sea elephant and penguin oil. I
had wirelessed asking for a dinghy to be sent down, which would enable
Hamilton to do more marine work; and it now came to hand. Further, we
received an additional supply of photographic material and some rubber
tubing for the anemometer, but the much needed boots did not arrive.

On the 18th a strong southerly gale sprang up and compelled the 'Rachel
Cohen' to seek safety in flight; so she slipped her cable and put to
sea. She had not yet landed all the sealers' stores and was forced to
hang about the island till the weather moderated sufficiently for her to
return to an anchorage.

The gentoo penguins, which had been observed at the beginning of the
month building their nests, commenced to lay, and the first ten eggs
were collected by us on September 18. Many sea elephant rookeries were
now well-formed as the cows began to arrive about the 11th and were soon
landing in large numbers. The first pups were heard on the 20th, and
Bauer and I walked along to the rookery from which the barking came and
had a look at the newcomers. There were only four, none of which was
more than a few hours old, but they yapped their displeasure, and the
mothers made frantic lunges at us when we approached to get a close view
of them.

The sealers always gave the animals time to form their rookeries and
then killed the bulls for oil. A well-conditioned full-grown animal
yields about half a tun of oil, and as the commodity when refined has
a market value of from L20 to L25 per tun, it will be seen that the
industry is a profitable one. The cows being small never have a very
thick coating of blubber, but I have seen bulls with blubber to a depth
of eight inches, and