Note 129 — XXII.

Only the immense numbers of sea-fowl, their extraordinary voracity, and the bounteous provision for supplying them with food, can furnish any possible explanation of the enormous mass accumulated here, even allowing for such a lapse of time. Mr. Tschudi, in the course of his travels in Peru, once kept for several days a live Sula variegata, which he was continually feeding with fish. He carefully collected the excrement, when, notwithstanding these birds eat much less in captivity than in a state of nature, it voided in a day from 3 1⁄2 to 5 oz.! According to other investigations in natural history, it seems that the pelican eats 20 lbs. a day of fish.