Broad-billed Petrel.
Although the sea-swallows and sea-mews are endowed with great power of wing, yet the petrels and albatrosses alone deserve the name of oceanic birds, as they are almost always found on the high seas, at every distance from land, and only during breeding-time seek the solitary coasts and islands. Petrels are scattered over the whole extent of the ocean, but the petrels which inhabit the northern seas are different from those of the antarctic ocean, and between both are other species, that never forsake the intertropical waters.
Fork-tailed Petrel.
The Fulmar (Procellaria glacialis) is at home in the high north. As soon as the whale-fisher has passed the Shetland Islands, on his way to the Arctic Seas, this bird is sure to accompany his track, eagerly watching for anything thrown overboard. Walking awkwardly on land, the fulmar flies to windward in the most terrific storms. Many thousands frequently accumulate round a dead whale, rushing in from all quarters. The sea immediately about the ship's stern, when the men are engaged in skinning their gigantic prey, is sometimes so completely covered with them that a stone can scarcely be thrown overboard without striking one of them. When anything is thus cast among the crowd, those nearest take alarm, and so on, till a thousand are put in motion; but as in rising they strike the water with their feet, a loud and most irregular splashing is produced. It is amusing to observe with what jealousy they view, and with what boldness they attack, any of their species engaged in devouring the finest morsels, and to hear the curious chuckling noise they make in their anxiety for despatch, lest they should be disturbed. The voracious birds are frequently so glutted as to be unable to fly, in which case they rest upon the water until the advancement of digestion restores their wonted powers. They then return to the banquet with the same gusto as before, and although numbers of the species may have been killed with boat-hooks, and float among them, the others, nothing daunted, and unconscious of danger to themselves, continue their gormandising labours. When carrion is scarce, the fulmars follow the living whale, as if they had a presentiment of his future fate, and sometimes, by their peculiar motions while hovering on the surface of the water, point out to the fisherman the position of the animal. As their beak cannot make an impression on the dead whale until some more powerful creature tears away the skin, it may be imagined how delighted they are when man takes upon himself the trouble of peeling a whale for them.
The Glacial Petrel (Procellaria gelida) does not seem to approach the pole so near as the fulmar. He appears but seldom in Iceland, but breeds frequently in Newfoundland. The same is the case with the Shearwater (P. puffinus), which breeds in great numbers on the Feroë islands, and in Orcadia. The tropical petrels are the least known. They do not appear to gather troopwise, and but seldom follow ships. Towards 45° S. lat. the first Pintados (P. capensis) make their appearance, and are more rarely seen after having passed 60° S. lat. The Giant Petrel (P. gigantea), extends its flight as far as the ice-banks of the south, where the Antarctic and the Snowy (P. antarctica et nivea) Petrels first appear, birds which never leave those dreary seas, and are often seen in vast flocks floating upon the drift ice. Thus nature has set bounds to petrels, as to all other creatures that swim or fly in and over the ocean, and has divided the wide deserts of the sea among their different species. Who can tell us the mysterious laws which assign to each of them its limits? Who can show us the invisible barriers they are not allowed to pass?
Stormy Petrel.
The Stormy Petrel (P. pelagica) seems to belong to every sea. It is about the size of a swallow, and in its general appearance and flight is not unlike that bird. Although the smallest web-footed bird known, it braves the utmost fury of the tempest, often skimming with incredible velocity the trough of the waves, and sometimes gliding rapidly over their snowy crests. Like all of its kind, it lives almost constantly at sea, and seeks during the breeding season some lonely rock, where it deposits in some fissure or crevice its solitary egg.