LITE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN DIVING BIRDS. 179 



ing his collections, he finds " only one specimen, which, however, is 

 very interesting, it being a young bird in its first winter plumage, 

 thus proving that the ring is not peculiar to old birds, as had been 

 supposed." 



Mr. William Brewster (1883), Dr. Louis B. Bishop (1889), and 

 Mr. C. J. Maynard (1896) all reported this bird in mated pairs on 

 Bird Rock, and suggested that it be entitled to specific rank. On my 

 visit to Bird Rock in 1915, 11 ringed murres were noted in a group 

 by themselves. Doctor Townsend, the same season, saw about 15 

 together in one place, on the south coast of Labrador, all belonging 

 to this form. Mr. Brewster added the follo^^ ing comment: 



If, as has been so generally maintained, it is simply an exceptional or dichro- 

 matic condition of L. troile, it is difficult to account for the fact that two or 

 three ringed individuals had selected mates of their own style among so many 

 thousands of the common kind, for it is well known that with other birds 

 addicted to dichromatism or great variability, the different varieties are quite 

 as apt to be found paired with their opposite extremes as with individuals of 

 similar coloring. 



Mr. William Palmer (1890) noticed in a specimen of this form, 

 collected at Bird Rock, that its feet " were much smaller and less 

 strongly colored " than those of the common murre. And finally no 

 such phase occurs in the California murre, the Pacific subspecies. 



On the other hand, Mr. Howard Saunders, in editing Yarrell's 

 British Birds (1871), states that, on the Fame Islands, he " observed 

 several birds with well-developed eye rings and streaks, sitting on 

 their eggs, whilst others exhibited gi'aclations from the above to the 

 usual furrow, with only a few white feathers at its junction with the 

 eye." Dr. Charles W. Townsend (1907) quotes Mr. S. H. C. Miiller 

 as saying that it " is certainly only a variety of Uria troile. I have 

 been an eyewitness that a ringed and a common guillemot have paired 

 themselves together and, besides, have seen a ringvia feed a young 

 one which a troile had under its wing." With the above evidence 

 before him I shall let the reader bring in his own verdict. 



Food. — The food of the murre consists largely of lant, capelin, and 

 other small fishes or the fry of larger species, which it pursues and 

 catches under water. Morris (1903) quotes the following account, 

 to show the apparent intelligence displayed by the murre in the pur- 

 suit of its prey : 



Mr. Couch observes of the guillemot, in his Illustrations of Instinct, " I have 

 watched with much interest the proceedings of this bird when capturing the 

 stragglers of a school of young mullets, and the admirable skill with which 

 their dispersion was prevented until a full meal had been secured. It is the 

 nature of this bird, as well as of most of those birds which habitually dive to 

 take their prey, to perform all their evolutions under water with the aid of 

 their wings ; but instead of dashing at once into the midst of the terrified group 

 of small fry, by which only a few would be captured, it passes round and round 

 55916— 1&— Bull. 107 13 



