After his return, Levick used his daily zoological notes as source material for two published penguin studies, one for the general public and a more scientific one to be included in the expedition’s official report. Intriguingly, this second account includes vague references to “’hooligan’ cocks” preying on chicks. Levick merely writes, “The crimes which they commit are such as to find no place in this book, but it is interesting indeed to note that, when nature intends them to find employment, these birds, like men, degenerate in idleness.” Now, modern-day researchers have discovered that Levick did in fact describe the hooligans’ crimes in the paper, “The sexual habits of the Adélie penguin.” This paper was expunged from his official account, probably because it was too disturbing for Edwardian mores. Levick himself covered some explicit passages of his personal notes with coded versions, rewritten in the Greek alphabet and pasted over the original entries.
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The text has been republished to reveal Levick’s detailed observations of the Adélie penguins' sexual habits, which included auto-erotic behavior, homosexual interactions, coerced sex (including with chicks and injured birds), and necrophilia.
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Although he adopted an objective tone in his paper, Levick’s personal notes evince disgust. “There seems to be no crime too low for these Penguins,”
