352 LAKIN^. 



built externally of thin twigs, debris and coarse grass, and lined with finer grasses. When built 

 amongst grass tussocks they, as a rule, are smaller and more compactly made, and formed 

 entirely of dried grass stems. An average nest measures externally six inches and three-quarters 

 in diameter, the inner, shallow, cup-shaped depression four inches in width by one inch and a 

 half in depth. 



The eggs are usually three, sometimes only two, and rarely four for a sitting. On Montague 

 Island Mr. A. F. B. Hull informed me, however, that he found in September, 1907, among a 

 large number of nests examined, two sets of five, the limit recorded by Gould, and one set of six. 

 They are extremely variable in the ground colour and disposition of their markings, oval or 

 elongate-oval in form, the shell for their size being comparatively close-grained and slightly 

 lustrous. In ground colour the most coiumon types found are of a pale green or brown, more 

 or less shaded with olive, which is spotted and blotched uniformly over the surface with 

 umber-brown or a darker shade of olive-brown, with which are intermingled fainter underlying 

 markings of dull violet-grey. Others are more or less sparingly covered with large spots, 

 irregular-shaped blotches, and a few streaks, dashes and blurrs of dark umber-brown and 

 brownish-black, and underlying markings of inky-grey, which predominate in some specimens 

 on the thicker end of the shell, where they form large coalesced patches or irregular ill-defined 

 zones. Specimens are sometimes found with penumbral markings or one colour partially over- 

 lying another, and eggs of two distinct types may be found in the same nest. 



Two sets of two each in the Australian Museum Collection, taken by Mr. D. B. Fry, in 

 October, 1910, on Erskine Island, in the Capricorn Group, off Fort Curtis, Northern Queens- 

 land, measure respectively :—(i) Length (A) 2-25 x 1-55 inches; (B) 2-26 x 1-54 inches; (2) 

 (A) 2-19 X 1-56 inches; (B) 2-25 x 1-49 inches. A set of four, taken by the late S. W. White, 

 of Adelaide, South Australia, measures :— Length (A) 218 x 1-57 inches; (B) 2-15 x 1.5 

 inches; (C) 2-1 x 1-55 inches; (D) 2-09 x 1-55 inches. A set of three received from Dr. Lons- 

 dale Hoiden, taken on Crayfish Island, off Circular Head, North-western Tasmania, measures: — 

 Length (.A) 2-qS x 1-58 inches; (B) 2-iS x 1-52 inches; (C) 2-17 x 1-54 inches. A set of two, 

 taken by Dr. Hoiden, on the same date and in the same locality measures : —Length (A) 2-22 

 X i'32 inches; (B) 2-27 x 1-51 inches. 



Immature birds resemble the adults, but have the upper wing-coverts, scapulars, and 

 feathers of the back spotted with brown ; the portion of the quills that is black in the adult is 

 brownish-black, and the bill is black, and brownish at the base. Wing-measurement of female 

 10-75 inches. 



In Queensland, Dr. W. Macgillivray found well feathered young in the nests in CJctober, in 

 New South Wales, September and October are the principal laying months, and in Southern 

 Victoria, the islands of Bass Strait, and Tasmania, the breeding season usually commences at 

 the latter end of October, eggs being more common in November, the season lasting until the 

 end of January or middle of February. 



<3en-u.s O-A-BIu^ISTTTS, ISr„.ch. 

 Gabianus pacificus. 



PACIFIC GULL. 

 Lams pacificus. Lath., Ind. Orn. Suppl., p. Ixviii. (1801) ; Gould, Bds. Austr., fol. Vol. VTI., 

 pi. 19 (1848); id., Handbk. Bds. Austr., Vol. IL, p. 38.") (18G5). 



Gabianus pacificus, Saunders, Cat. Bds. Brit. Mus., Vol. XXV., p. 297 (1896); Sharpe, Hand-1. 

 Bds., Vol. L, p. 143 (1899). : 



