at the sharks which soon thronged round the ship, and about which we were
to think more before the day was done.

The boat came back with the news that a possible landing-place had been
found, and the landing parties got off about 8.30. The landing was very
bad--a ledge of rock weathered out of the cliff to our right formed, as
it were, a staging along which it was possible to pass on to a steeply
shelving talus slope in front of us. The sea being comparatively smooth,
everybody was landed dry, with their guns and collecting gear.

The best account of South Trinidad is contained in a letter written by
Bowers to his mother, which is printed here. But some brief notes which I
jotted down at the time may also be of interest, since they give an
account of a different part of the island:

"Having made a small depôt of cartridges, together with a little fluffy
tern and a tern's egg, which Wilson found on the rocks, we climbed
westward, round and up, to a point from which we could see into the East
Bay. This was our first stand, and we shot several white-breasted petrel
(Oestrelata trinitatis), and also black-breasted petrel (Oestrelata
arminjoniana). Later on we got over the brow of a cliff where the petrel
were nesting. We took two nests, on each of which a white-breasted and a
black-breasted petrel were paired. Wilson caught one in his hands and I
caught another on its nest; it really did not know whether it ought to
fly away or not. This gives rise to an interesting problem, since these
two birds have been classified as different species, and it now looks as
though they are the same.

"The gannets and terns were quite extraordinary, like all the living
things there. If you stay still enough the terns perch on your head. In