. Mutton birds and other birds . of an entireabsence of any perceptible motive it was the glamour of night or that theemotion of the swifth^-wheeling bird movedsomething in the man not stirred by the vaster,slower balancings in distances more immense ofthe Albatross. It was a never-ending interest to follow withthe eye one of these living, moving lines of flight,to mark the earthward swoop, to trace it dark-ling across the islands bulk, to link up onceagain the half lost curve as it emerged black anddistinct against the pale, pure, evening sky. In each of these giant Ioo^ds of flig
. Mutton birds and other birds . of an entireabsence of any perceptible motive it was the glamour of night or that theemotion of the swifth^-wheeling bird movedsomething in the man not stirred by the vaster,slower balancings in distances more immense ofthe Albatross. It was a never-ending interest to follow withthe eye one of these living, moving lines of flight,to mark the earthward swoop, to trace it dark-ling across the islands bulk, to link up onceagain the half lost curve as it emerged black anddistinct against the pale, pure, evening sky. In each of these giant Ioo^ds of flight, the birdmost nearly touched earth over the mouth of hisbreeding burrow, but the speed at which thepoint of attraction was passed, at firstgave hardly a hint of any desire toland. After many revolutions there camea time however, wdien a certain retarda-tion of pace could be marked, and whenthe faintest hesitant wing flicker, the meresttremor of the extreme tips of the primariescould be observed. Still later, ahvays just over. AND OTHER BIRDS 27 the Inirrow, this tremor became a poise,—a poiseinterpolated for an instant in the ])irds yet swiftunwavering flight, and without apparent checkto the speed of the sk}n;\^ard climb, a miracle ofbalanced flight. At last the bird would diopwith a plump through scrub, or rustle with armi into tangles of vine. Most of these flying Petrels arrived without acall of anv sort. The Kuaka was quite silent;the Mutton Bird was also quite silent on thisnight, although later in the year, but even thenvery rarelv, I have heard him call on the wing,—a call, I may say, entirely dissimilar to the Te-te-te and burr of the Petrel that duringDecember can be heard at night flying inlandover many parts of the east coast of the NorthIsland. From either the Parara or Titi Wainui,ghost-like in their pale blue plumage now almostturned to white, came a rare Zp-zp. About eight or nine oclock there werehundreds of thousands or, as I have computed,millions, of
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookidmuttonbirdso, bookyear1914
