THE NODDY.

Sterna stolida, Linn.*

Has been procured on the coast on one occasion,

As recorded by me in the following words :-" In March 1833, when looking over the collection of Irish birds belonging to Thomas W. Warren, Esq., of Dublin, I perceived, to my surprise, amongst them a specimen of the Sterna stolida. On being informed that this bird had been received as Irish from William Massey, Esq., of the Pigeon-house, and that his collection contained a second specimen, I waited on this gentleman to make inquiry respecting them. In May 1834 he informed me, that in the summer about four years previously, he was favoured with the two birds in question, by the captain of a vessel, who stated that they had been shot in his presence a few days before, between the Tusker Lighthouse, off the coast of Wexford, and Dublin Bay. That only a few days had elapsed since these birds were killed was apparent, not only to Mr. Massey himself (who, from occasionally preserving birds for his own collection, is conversant with such subjects), but to Mr. Glennon, the bird-preserver, by whom they were set up. Their having been skinned by an unskilful person, who left some of the flesh adhering to the skin without applying any preservative to it, proved their comparatively recent state to more than one sense.

"The history of these birds, as just given, was related to me when I first saw them; but I did not feel myself warranted in bringing it forward, without having the direct testimony of Mr. Massey. Both specimens are in mature plumage. This is, I believe, the first record of the occurrence of the S. stolida in Europe."

The preceding note was communicated to the Linnean Society of London, in June 1834, and soon afterwards published. Since that period, this bird has been mentioned by Temminck, in the

* Genus Anous, Leach; Megalopterus, Boie.

fourth part of his 'Manuel,' p. 461-which appeared in 1840as met with on the coast of France; but whether on the Mediterranean or Atlantic coast is not stated.

A second record of the occurrence of this species in the British Seas, appears, in a letter from Mr. Austin, in the ninth volume of the Annals of Natural History,' p. 435, dated Bristol, June 4, 1842. The Sterna stolida is there mentioned as "a summer visitor to St. George's Channel," and it is remarked that "the flight of the noddy is extremely rapid, and it is so exceedingly shy, that I could never get a shot at one, though watching many times for a chance.' As I have never observed this bird on the main shore, which it seldom, if ever, approaches, it probably retires, after feeding, to some insulated rock to repose itself, without fear of interruption. It appears a solitary bird, never assembling in flocks like the S. hirundo, but singly seeks its food at some distance from land, though it occasionally pursues its prey into the estuaries of the larger Irish rivers, or along the outer shores of the coast."

Audubon, in the fifth volume of his 'Ornithological Biography,' gives a most interesting account of this species as an American bird. It is copied in Yarrell's History of British Birds' (vol. iii.), where the best information from other works is also included.

SABINE'S GULL.

Fork-tailed Gull.

Larus Sabini, Sabine.*

Young birds of the year have, in a very few instances, been met with in autumn.

I FIRST noticed its occurrence in Ireland, before the Linnean Society, on the 15th of April, 1834, and a brief abstract of the communication was then published in the 'London and Edinburgh * See p. 314 of. isvolume.

Philosophical Magazine,' vol. v. p. 299. The Magazine of Zoology and Botany' (vol. i. p. 460) contained a full notice of the first two birds; and all additional information procured down to 1838 was brought together and published in the sixth part of the second series of Jardine and Selby's' Illustrations of Ornithology.' The whole matter may be repeated here. The following was read before the Linnean Society, on the 15th of April, 1834 :—“ On the present occasion I have not only the high satisfaction of enriching the British Fauna, by adding to it the beautiful Larus Sabini, so lately discovered, but of describing the species in the plumage of the first year, in which attire it has never before come under the inspection of the ornithologist. The bird now exhibited was shot in Belfast Bay, on the 18th of September, 1822, by the late John Montgomery, Esq., of Locust Lodge, who carefully preserved it, under the impression that it was an individual of the closelyallied species Larus minutus, by which name it was distinguished, when presented in April 1833 to the Natural History Society of Belfast. Mr. Montgomery informed me, that from the diminutive size, &c., of this bird when first seen by him, he had no doubt of its rarity. It was so unwary as to alight once or twice within twenty yards of him; but, to avoid disfiguring it, he fired from so great a distance, that it was only at the third shot eventually obtained. That the species is regardless of the report of a gun, was witnessed by Captain Sabine, in its breeding-haunts within the arctic circle, as he states, that when one bird of a pair was killed, its mate, though frequently fired at, continued on wing close to the spot where it lay.'

Although the Larus Sabini closely approximates the Larus minutus in general appearance, the plumage of the first year, as well as that of maturity, being very similar in both species, the superior size of the L. Sabini, its tail being forked to the depth of an inch, and the comparatively greater length of its tibia and tarsus, may always (even in a preserved state) afford sufficient specific distinction. In the form of the tail, the L. Sabini approaches the typical species of Sterna more nearly than its congener, the L. minutus. The latter, however, resembles that

genus more in the form of the bill, and in the dimensions of the tarsus and tibia.

"In this specimen of the L. Sabini, in the autumnal plumage of the first year, the forehead, space immediately above the eye, and between it and the bill (with the exception of the narrow line of greyish-black closely encircling the front and lower part of the eye), upper part of the throat, and sides of the neck, are white; crown, nape, and back of the neck, blackish-grey; back, scapulars, greater and lesser wingcoverts, blackish-grey, tinged with yellowish-brown, the extremity of every feather varying from greyish-white to white, as it approaches the tail; under part of the throat and upper part of the breast, pale ash-colour; lower breast and all the under plumage, white; shafts of the first six primaries brownish-black at base, becoming gradually darker towards the extremity, where they are black in the first three, but in the fourth, fifth, and sixth, they assimilate in colour to the feather at that part, which is white; the entire of the outer webs of the first five, black; the inner webs, with a broad edging of white to within from one to two inches of the end, which part is black in the first three, but tipped with white in the fourth and fifth; in the sixth the inner web is white, the outer black, excepting for three or four lines from the tip, where it is white, and again, at about an inch from the end, where a white spot of an oval shape appears.* Feathers of the tail twelve in number, white, with black tips; in the two shortest the latter colour extends upwards of an inch from the end, in the outer web especially; of the other feathers, the black prevails in a less degree as they increase in length; upper and under tail-coverts white.

[March 1838.-Having just seen the notes of the late Mr. Montgomery on this

*This marking of the sixth primary is just the opposite of that observed by Mr. Sabine in some mature specimens, in which its prevailing colour was white, "with sometimes a black spot near the end." Dr. Richardson has remarked, in the 'Fauna Bor.-Amer.,' that this primary is subject to variation.

This is placed so high that the point of the nail does not reach within 14 line of the ground.

individual, I am enabled to add the recent colour of the bill, legs, &c., which in the immature bird has not been described. Under the name of Larus minutus, which that gentleman considered it to be, he remarked ;-" irides dark; bill dark; legs pale flesh-colour; weight 5 oz."]

"In the museum of the Royal Dublin Society, I lately observed, without having any label attached to it, a second specimen of Larus Sabini. Upon inquiry from Mr. Wall, the very obliging curator (who treasured the bird as a rarity, though he had not. ascertained its species,) I learned that it had been shot by himself in Dublin Bay, near Kingstown, a few years before, but he could not recollect at what season. The stage of plumage, however, affords sufficient evidence of its having been killed in autumn, as it is a bird of the first year, and similar in appearance to the specimen in the Belfast Museum.

"The occurrence of only two individuals of this species within the eastern hemisphere, has hitherto been recorded, both of which were obtained by Captain Sabine at Spitzbergen."-Read before Linnean Society, April 5, 1834, and published in full in Mag. Zool. and Bot., vol. i. pp. 460, 462.

"A third specimen of the Larus Sabini occurred last autumn in Ireland. It was shot on or about September 15, 1834, on the shore of Belfast Bay, near Claremont, the residence of Mrs. Clewlow, in whose possession it now is.* It is a young bird of the year, and in plumage similar to the other two individuals of this species, which I had the satisfaction of announcing to the Linnean Society, last year, as having been obtained in Ireland."+ "The dimensions of this bird, taken in the same manner, and compared with those of the individual above described, exhibit but one difference at all worthy of notice; its first quill being longer than the second, though the second slightly exceeds the first, in the latter specimen."-Mag. Zool. and Bot. vol. i. p. 464.

"I have to record the occurrence of a fourth L. Sabini in

* Subsequently bequeathed, as part of that lady's collection of natural history, to the Belfast Museum.

Proceedings of Zoological Society of London, 1835, p. 83.