818 



SYSTEMATIC SYNOPSIS — PYGOPOBES. 



this bare turgid space flesh-colored in life, drying pale yellowish. Length 18.00; extent 32.00; 

 wing 8.50; tarsus 1.25; bill along culmen 1.40, along gape 2.20; gonys 0.90; depth at angle 

 0.55, width at base of nostrils 0.30, at angle of mouth 0.80. N. Atlantic and Polar and 

 N. Pacific shores and islands, in myriads ; on the Atlantic S. in winter to the Middle States, 

 breeding from the Gulf of St. Lawrence northward. The N. Pacific form, unquestionably 

 of the " thick-billed" species, does not exhibit the extreme of shortness and stoutness as just 



described for the At' 

 lantic ; wiih a cul' 

 men of about 1.67, 

 the depth opposite 

 nostrils is hardly 0.G7, 

 thus less than half 

 the length of cuhnen, 

 instead of about half; 

 gape nearly 3.00. 

 The sides of the up- 

 per mandible are char- 

 acteristically dUated 

 and denuded, of a 

 ) than in the common 



Fig. 558. — Californian Guillemot, nat. size. 



glaucous bluish color ; the tip of the bill is less deflexed, though more 

 guillemot. This is the great "egg-bird" of the high N. Pacific; -on St. George's, one of the 

 Prybilov group, for example, the birds ''go flying around the island in great files and platoons, 

 ixlways circling against or quartering, on the wing, at regular hours in the moi-uiug and the 

 evening, making a dark girdle of birds more than a quarter of a mile broad and thirty miles 

 long, whirling round and round the island, and forcing upon the most casual observer a lasting 

 impression." The N. Pacific form is L. arra proper; that of the N. Atlantic is " Briinnich's 

 guillemot," differing as said, and perhaps constituting a subspecies aj^art (L. a. svarbag). 

 347 UTAMA'NIA. (Cretan name of the bird.) Razor-bill Auk. Size, ibrm, and general 

 aspect of the last genus. Bill about as long as 

 head, densely feathered for half its length, the 

 feathers extending on upper mandible beyond mid- 

 dle of commissure, those on lower somewhat far- 

 ther. Bill greatly compressed, cultrate, sulcate, 

 hooked; culmen ridged, regularly convex; com- 

 missure straight to the hook ; gonys about straight. 

 Nostrils linear, marginal, densely feathered. Tarsi 

 scutellate in front. Tail short, pointed, of stifiisli, 

 acute feathers. Wings normal, efl'cctivo for flight. 

 Bicolor. Egg single, colored. One species. 

 S'^T- U. tor'da. "(Name of the bird.) Razor-billed Auk. Tinker. Adult in summer : Bii! 

 and feet black, the former with a white line occupying the length of the middle sulcus on botli 

 mandibles ; mouth yellow; eye bluisli. A strict, sunken line of white from eye to base o. 

 culmen. Head and neck all around and upper parts black, glossy and intense on the latte:' 

 lustreless opaque brownish-black on the sides and front of the former. Tips of secondaries 

 and entire under parts from the neck, including lining of wings, white. In winter : White 

 reaching to bill, and invading sides of head and neck ; the dark parts duller. Young : Like 

 the adults in winter ; smaller ; duller ; bill unformed, and like the feet not black. Nestlings 

 clotlied with sooty down, paler or whitish below. In the adults, the sharp white line from 

 bill to eye is very characteristic, appearing with the first feathering, but sometimes fiiils in 

 winter birds. Length about 18.00; extent 27-00; wing 7-75; tail 3.50, graduated 1.25; 



Fig. 559. — Thick-billed Guillemot, nat. size. 



