28 HISTORY OF THE 



The birds are said to be common throughout the continent, 

 but I have never been so fortunate as to meet with them often, 

 or in numbers. 



In their food habits, are much like the Franklin's GulL In 

 their northward flights arrive early, and do not tarry long. At 

 Pewaukee, Wisconsin, where I lived during the early settlement 

 of the State, I noticed nearly every spring a few flocks flying 

 about the lake and alighting upon the melting ice, but I cannot 

 recall seeing them on the lake after the ice was wholly gone. 



The birds are quite noisy, fly gracefully, and float on the sur- 

 face of the water as lightly as an e^g shell, and when at rest 

 dx'ift as readily in the breeze. They breed in high latitudes, 

 and in communities; their nests are placed on bushes and trees, 

 usually on the branching limbs of the spruce trees, and are 

 made of sticks and lined with grasses, leaves, often moss and 

 lichens, with an occasional mixture of down. Eggs usually 

 three, rarely ever four. One set of two eggs, taken July 5th, 

 1864, by Mr. Farlane, on Anderson river, Arctic America, meas- 

 ure: 2.08x1.40, 1.96x1.40. Ground color olive gray, with small 

 spots of varying shades of brown, chiefly clove brown, thickest 

 about larger end; in form, oval to ovate. 



Genus XEMA Leach. 



"Size small or medium; tail forked; tarsus equal to or rather shorter than 

 the middle toe with claw; adult with a dark hood, the plumage otherwise pearl 

 gray above and white beneath." 



Xema sabinii (Sab.). 



SABINE'S GULL. 

 PLATE n. 



A rare visitant. 



B. 680. R. 677. C. 700. G.S12, 10. U. 62. 



Habitat. Arctic regions in North America; south in winter 

 to New York, Kansas and Great Salt Lake. 



Sp. Char. '^AduU, in summer: Head and upper part of the neck plumbeous, 

 bounded below by a well-defined collar of black, widest behind; lower part of 

 neck, entire lower parts, tail, upper tail coverts, and lower part of rump, snow 

 white, the lower parts faintly tinged with delicate rose pink in some freshly- 

 killed specimens. Mantle deep bluish gray (nearly the same shade as in Larus 



