climb up unobserved, suddenly laid hands on it. On placing it in
a meat-safe, which we extemporised as a cage, it ate ravenously,
as well it might after its long journey.
When in the latitude of Lisbon, and i8o miles to the westward
of the Portuguese coast, a large “ sea-flier ” bird paid us a visit,
soaring over the waves in our vicinity, and evidently on the lookout
for garbage from the ship. The plumage of the upper surface
of wings and body was of a dusky brown colour, the under surface
of the body was whitish, and the wings were long and pointed;
in mode of flight he resembled a large tern. He did not long
remain with us, probably not finding it a sufficiently productive
hunting-ground. I may here mention that on the 6th of October,
when a hundred miles from Madeira, we sighted a bird answering
the same description.
All opportunities of plying the tow-net were duly availed of,
but owing to the unusually rapid speed of the ship, these were few.
However, we succeeded in capturing many specimens of living
Foraminifers (mostly of the genus Orbitolites), stalk-eyed Crustaceans,
Radiolarians, an lanthina, a few Salpse, and the pretty
little Pteropod Mollusc, the Criseis Aciciilata, besides many other
organisms which the rapid motion of the net through the water
had rendered unrecognizable. As it is usually found that these
minute pelagic organisms are to be obtained from the surface in
most abundance at night-time, and during the day retreat for
some fathoms from the glare of the sunlight, I constructed a
wooden apparatus on the principle of a kite, which I attached to
the towing line at some three or four yards from the net, and
which had the effect of dragging down the net some yards below
the surface, and then retaining it at a uniform depth. It of
course required to be adjusted each time to suit the required
depth and the rate of the vessel, but it had this great advantage
over the usual system of employing heavy weights, that the strain
not being nearly so great, a light and manageable rope could be
used ; and that, moreover, the adjustment for depth could be
readily made by altering the trim of this water-kite. When I
first tried this apparatus, and before I had succeeded in trimming
it satisfactorily, it caused great amusement to the blue-jackets by
the playful manner in which it manoeuvred under our stern, now
diving deeply towards our rudder post (the shimmer of the white
wood in the deep blue water reminding one of a dolphin), and
now whimsically rising rapidly to the surface with an impetus
that shot it fully six feet out of the water.
On the 4th of October, the captain made some experiments
with the “ Lucas deep-sea sounder.” It consists of a strong brass
drum carrying 2,000 fathoms of fine steel wire, and fitted with a
cyclometer which registers on a dial the number of fathoms of
wire run out. The sinker, which weighs 20 lbs., is made of lead,
and has at its lower extremity a bull-dog snapper, which, on
striking the ground, shuts up suddenly, so as to enclose a sample
of the sea bottom. The apparatus is supposed to be capable of
sounding to a depth of 500 fathoms in a vessel going 5 knots,
and to 50 fathoms when going 12 knots. It is said to be a
modification of an invention of Sir W. Thompson’s. We subsequently
used this largely, and found it to be a most convenient
and expeditious method of sounding to depths of 500 fathoms,
with the ship almost stationary. The wire could be wound up
again while the ship was under way.
During the forenoon of this same day we saw, to our astonishment,
a land swallow, which flew about the ship for a few minutes,
and then went on his way rejoicing. He would have had to travel
254 miles to make the nearest land, which was the island of Porto
Santo.
An erratic fragment of gulfweed {Sargassum Bacciferuni) was
entangled in the tow-net on the 5 th of October, when we were
105 miles north-east of Madeira, a circumstance which is of interest
as regards the distribution of the plant, the locality cited being
considerably beyond the northern limit of the great eddy between
the Gulf Stream and the Atlantic equatorial current, commonly
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