1086 SYSTEMATIC SYNOPSIS.— PYGOPODES-ALC.E. 



duller ; bill smaller, unformed, ungrooved, aud lacking any white line. Nestlings clothed with 

 sooty down overlaid with rufous, jjaler or whitish on head, neck, and below. Length of adults 

 about 18.00; extent 27.00; wing 7.75; tail 3.50, graduated 1.25 ; tarsus 1.25; middle or outer 

 toe and claw 2.00, inner 1.40 ; chord of culmen 1.30, arc J .50 ; gape 2.25 ; gonys 0.75 ; greatest 

 depth of bill 0.90. This Auk abounds on the North Atlantic, both coasts, and parts of the 

 Polar seas. On our coast, it breeds in great numbers in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, about New- 

 foundland and Labrador, and strays S. in winter to the Middle States, like other Alcidce, and 

 casually to North Carolina. A very few still occur in summer at Grand Manan. Eggs usu- 

 ally laid in caverns and fissures of rocks along precipitous shore-lines, often with those of 

 Murres, Sea-pigeons, and Puffins; about 3.00 X scant 2.00, white with creamy or milky- 

 bluish tint, never green like those of Murres, spotted and blotched, but not fantastically traced 

 over, with different shades of umber-brown ; less pointed ; laid in June and July. Utamania 

 tarda of former editions of the Key. 



PLAU'TUS. (Lat. flat-footed.) His Grace, The Auk, who lost the use of his wings, aud 

 perished off the face of the earth in consequence. 



P. impen'nis. (Lat. impennis, wingless. Fig. 747.) The Great Auk, or Garefowl. 

 Largest of the family: length about 30.00; wing 6.00; tail 3.00, of 14 feathers; bill along 

 gape 4.25; chord of culmen 3.15; greatest depth of upper mandible 1.00, of lower 0.67; 

 greatest width of bill 0.67; tarsus 1.67; middle toe and claw 3.25; outer 3.00; inner 

 2.25. A great white oval spot between eye and bill. Hood and mantle dark; under parts 

 white, extending in a point on the throat ; ends of secondaries white. Bill black, with white 

 grooves; feet black; iris hazel-brown. Special interest attaches to this bird, which is now 

 extinct, largely through human agency. It formerly inhabited the North American coast from 

 Massachusetts northward, as attested by earlier observers, and by the plentiful occurrence of 

 its bones in shell-heaps; also Greenland, Iceland, and the northwest shores of Europe from the 

 British islands nearly to the Arctic Circle. On our shores it was apparently last alive at Funk 

 Island off the south coast of Newfoundland ; in Iceland, its living history has been brought down 

 to 1844. For some years it vcas currently, but prematurely, reported extinct. Mr. R. Deane 

 has recorded (Am. Nat. vi, 1872, 368) that a specimen was " found dead in the vicinity of 

 St. Augustine, Labrador, in November, 1870; " this one, though in poor condition, being sold 

 for $200, and sent to Europe. But there appears to be some question respecting the character, 

 date, and disposition of tliis alleged individual; and it seems very improbable that the species 

 lived down to 1870. I know of only four specimens in this country, — in the Smithsonian 

 Institution, in the Philadelphia Academy, the Cambridge Museum, and Vassar College, 

 Poughkeepsie (the latter the original of Audubon's figures). There is an egg in each of the 

 first two mentioned collections. In pattern of coloration the egg is like that of the Razor- 

 billed Auk, though it is of course much larger, measuring about 5.00 X 3.00. About 70 skins 

 appear to be preserved in various museums, with as many eggs, some 6 more or less complete 

 skeletons, and other bones representing perhaps 100 individuals. 



