Ornithological and Other Oddities 



different colour-forms, may also enter into the 

 problem as to which is to survive, so that it 

 is begging the question to attribute the issue 

 to climate alone. 



In the Red Sea one makes the acquaintance 

 of two very peculiar-looking gulls which are 

 always confined to hot climates. Both are about 

 the size of our common gull, so called — I 

 cannot recall having seen it on any Eastern 

 voyage — but they differ much in colour ; one, 

 the Larus leucophthalmus y which I have only 

 seen at the head of this sea, and then not 

 often, has dark slate-coloured wings and a jet- 

 black head with white eyelids, while the other, 

 Larus hemprichi, which is especially abundant 

 towards Aden, where it is very tame, has snuffy- 

 brown wings and a brown hood, set off by 

 yellow legs and bill, the latter with a red patch 

 near the tip. The young of both these species 

 are of a mottled brown, like so many young 

 gulls, and hence are not so striking in appear- 

 ance. The brown Hemprich's gull will not un- 

 frequently even settle on the ship ; at Aden it 

 is frequently to be seen standing on the iron 

 buoys in the harbour, under a sun which must 

 certainly make the metal too hot to be endured 

 by a human foot. Another brown sea-bird very 

 much in evidence in the Red Sea is the booby 



(Sula leucogaster), a species of gannet. It is 



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