1st February. Killed Diomedea antarctica, Procellaria lugens and turtur. The first, or black-billed albatross, is much like the common one, but differs in being scarcely half as large, and having a bill entirely black. Procellaria lugens, the southern shearwater, differs from the common kind in being smaller and of a darker colour on the back, but is easily distinguished by the flight, which is heavy, and by two fasciæ or streaks of white, which are very conspicuous when it flies, under its wings. Procellaria turtur, Mother Carey's dove, is of the petrel kind, about the size of a Barbary dove, of a light silvery blue upon the back, which shines beautifully as the bird flies. Its flight is very swift and it remains generally near the surface of the water. More or less of these birds have been seen very often since we left the latitude of Falkland's Island, where in a gale of wind we saw immense quantities of them.
3rd. Shot Diomedea exulans, an albatross, or alcatrace, much larger than those seen to the northward of the Straits of Le Maire, and often quite white on the back between the wings, though certainly the same species; D. antarctica, lesser black-billed albatross; D. profuga, lesser albatross, with a party-coloured bill differing from the last in few things except the bill, the sides of which were yellow, with black between them.
4th. I had been unwell these three or four days, and to-day was obliged to keep the cabin with a bilious attack, which, although quite slight, alarmed me a good deal, as Captain Wallis had such an attack in the Straits of Magellan, which he never got the better of throughout the whole voyage.
5th. I was well enough to eat part of the albatrosses shot on the 3rd; they were so good that everybody commended and ate heartily of them, although there was fresh pork upon the table. To dress them, they are skinned overnight, and the carcases soaked in salt water until morning, then parboiled, and, the water being thrown away, stewed well with very little water, and when sufficiently tender served up with savoury sauce.
