doubt, in so unfrequented a situation, and so delightful a climate, will
quickly increase in numbers.' I am afraid we did not find any of their
descendants, nor those of the pig and goats."[34] I doubt whether fowls
would survive the land crabs very long. There are many wild birds on the
island, however, which may feed the shipwrecked, and also a depôt left by
the Government for that purpose. Another visitor was Knight, who wrote a
book called The Cruise of the Falcon, concerning his efforts to discover
the treasure which is said to have been left there. Scott also visited it
in the Discovery in 1901, when a new petrel was found which was
afterwards called 'Oestrelata wilsoni,' after the same 'Uncle Bill' who
was zoologist of both Scott's Expeditions.

And so it came about that on the evening of July 25 we furled sail and
lay five miles from South Trinidad with all our preparations made for a
very thorough search of this island of treasure. Everything was to be
captured, alive or dead, animal, vegetable or mineral.

At half-past five the next morning we were steaming slowly towards what
looked like a quite impregnable face of rock, with bare cliffs standing
straight out of the water, which, luckily for us, was comparatively
smooth. As we coasted to try and find a landing-place the sun was rising
behind the island, which reaches to a height of two thousand feet, and
the jagged cliffs stood up finely against the rosy sky.

[Illustration: SOUTH TRINIDAD--E. A. Wilson, del.]

We dropped our anchor to the south of the island and a boat's crew left
to prospect for a landing-place, whilst Wilson seized the opportunity to
shoot some birds as specimens, including two species of frigate bird,
and the seamen caught some of the multitudinous fish. We also fired shots