amber@scott.stat.washington.edu (Amber Tatnall) (08/30/89)
From Ernest A. Choate's "The Dictionary of American Bird Names (Boston: Gambit, 1973), page 47. Mother Carey's Chicken: A sailor's name for petrel. Yarrell, who wrote A History of British Birds in 1843, stated, "The name was given by Capt. Carteret's sailors, from some unknown hag of that name." It has also been suggested that she is a witch of the sea accompanied by imps in the form of the little black birds. According to others she is the aunt of Davy Jones. Weekley conjectures that the term is English sailor corruption of Italian "madre cara", "dear mother", to whom the sailors of southern Europe were wont to breathe a prayer when the gales began to blow.