210 ALASKA. 



general aspect is much like that of a pigeoirs egg, excepting 

 the roughness of the shell. 



^'The chick is covered with a thick, uniform, dark- grayish- 

 black down, which is speedily succeeded by feathers, all darker 

 than those of the parent, when it takes flight from the islands 

 for the year six weeks after. The parents feed their young by 

 disgorging, and when the young birds leave, they are as large 

 and heavy as the old ones. I am strongly inclined to think 

 that the male bird feeds the female while incubating, but have 

 not been able to verify tins supposition by observation, as the 

 birds are always hidden from sight at the time." 



634. Lomvia troJIe var. caiiforiisca, (Bry.) Coues.— IT/o-re Guilk- 

 mot. 

 Cepphfis lomvia, Pall. Zoog. E. A., ii, 345, (1811.) 

 Lria troile, Newb. Pac. R. R. Kep., vi, pt. iv, 110, (1S57.) 

 Cataractes calif oruicus, Bryant. Proc. Bost. Soc. 11, fig. 3, 5, (1861.) 

 Lomvia calif ornica, Coues. Prcc. Phila. Acad., fig. 16, (1868.) 

 Lomvia troile var. californica, Coues. Key N. A. Birds, 346, (18r2.) 



All the Murres of the troUe type we have seen from the North 

 Pacific agree in possessing a particular shape of the bill, readily 

 distinguishable from that presented by the Atlantic birds. 

 AVhile we would by no means insist upon, or even admit, that 

 this is a specific character, especially since we have no doubt 

 that some of the circum polar colonies of these birds will show 

 an intermediate style, we think it as well to recognize the char- 

 acter by a varietal name. The shape is difficult to descri])e in 

 words: the gonydeal angle is stronger, pointed, and more pro- 

 tuberant, the gonys straighter and more decidedly ascending, 

 the culmen less deflected at the tip, and the commissure conse- 

 quently straighter than are these several points in true troile. 

 It is, in short, some approach to the configuration of the bill in 

 L. svarbag, {hriinnichii of authors.) 



*' Limited numbers of the Californian guillemot are found 

 occasionally perched on the cliffs with the ^arric^ tiiey can 

 only be distinguished at a slight distance by a practiced eye, 

 for they resemble their allies so closely and conform so strictly 

 to their habits, that it will be but repeating the description of 

 the L. arm., given here, should I attempt it. The largest gath- 

 ering of these birds I have ever seen at any one place on the 

 islands was a squad of about fifty, at the high blufl's on Saint 

 George's, last summer; but they are generally scattered by 

 ones, twos, and threes, among thousands and tens of thousands 

 of the arra.^^ 



