rbour, and we had a pleasant change in the
menu for dinner. They were of the type known as Notothenia, to which
reference has already been made.

By October 13, when a stray silver-grey petrel appeared, every one was
on the qui vive for the coming of the penguins. In 1912 they had arrived
on October 12, and as there was much floating ice on the northern
horizon, we wondered if their migration to land had been impeded.

The winds were very high for the ensuing two days, and on the 17th the
horizon was clearer and more "water sky" was visible. Before lunch
on that day there was not a living thing along the steep, overhanging
ice-foot, but by the late afternoon thirteen birds had effected a
landing, and those who were not resting after their long swim were
hopping about making a survey of the nearest rookeries. One always has
a "soft spot" for these game little creatures--there is something
irresistibly human about them--and, situated as we were, the wind seemed
of little account now that the foreshores were to be populated by the
penguins--our harbingers of summer and the good times to be. Three days
later, at the call of the season, a skua gull came flapping over the
Hut.

It was rather a singular circumstance that on the evening of the 17th,
coincident with the disappearance of the ice on the horizon, wireless
signals suddenly came through very strongly in the twilight at 9.30
P.M., and for many succeeding nights continued at the same intensity. On
the other hand, during September, when the sea was either firmly frozen
or strewn thickly with floe-ice, communication was very fitful and
uncertain. The fact is therefore suggested that wireless waves are for
some reason more readily transmitted across a surface of water than
across ice.

The weather during the rest of October and for the first weeks
of November took on a phase of heavy snowfalls which we knew were
inevitable before summer could be really established. The winds were
very often in the "eighties" and every four or five days a calm might be
expected.

The penguins had a tempestuous time building their nests, and resuming
once more the quaint routine of their rookery life. In the hurricanes
they usually ceased work and crouched behind rocks until the worst was
over. A great number of birds were observed to have small wounds on
the body which had bled and discoloured their feathers. In one case a
penguin had escaped, presumably from a sea-leopard, with seve