"At last I got down near the water. Just at the head of the bay was a shelving shore, and along at the sides, as far as I could see it was rocky, and there were plenty of seals here too. Along on the beach and on the rock and on the terraces were quantities of birds--penguins, as I knew from what I had heard of them. They did not try to get out of my way, but just made an angry sort of noise. 'I will talk to you presently, my hearties,' I said; 'what I have got to do now is to look for a shelter.' It was the end of April, and I knew that it would not be long before winter would be upon me, and if I was not out of it by that time I should soon be frozen stiff. I did not go near the seals, for I did not want to frighten them. I looked about the rest of that afternoon and all next day, but I could not find what you might properly call a cave, and so determined to make use of the best place I could fix upon. This was a spot in the lower terrace, in the face of the rock. It seemed as if the lower part was softer than the upper, which was black and hard and almost like glass. Underneath this the rock had crumbled away perhaps six feet in depth.