GAVIyE. 



283 



277. FRATERCULA MONOCERATA. 

 (HORN-BILLED PUFFIN.) 



Alca monocei'ata, Pallas, Zoogr. Rosso- Asiat. ii. p. 361 (1826). 



The Horn-billed PufBu in breeding-dress is easily diagnosed by the 

 remarkable horny projection above its nostrils^ but as this is cast 

 every autumn, other characters must be found to distinguish it in 

 winter plumage. The combination of a iving from the carpal joint 

 between 6*4 and 7'8 inches long, and a bill, exclusive of the horny pro- 

 jection, '8 inch or less in height will exclude every other Japanese 

 species. 



Figures: Gray, Genera of Birds, iii. pi. 174 (woodcut of head) ; 

 Eschscholtz^ Zool. Atlas, pi. 12. 



Head of Fratercida monocerata. f natural size. 



The Horn-billed Puffin was included by Temminck and Schlegel in 

 the list of Japanese birds at the end of the ' Fauna Japonica ' on the 

 authority of a Japanese drawing ; but it was first legitimately intro- 

 duced into the Japanese list from examples obtained at Hakodadi in 

 1854 by Mr. Heine, the artist of the Perry Expedition (Cassin, Exp. 

 Am. Squad. China Seas and Japan, ii. p. 233) ; and has since been 

 found to be by no means a scarce bird in that locality, breeding in 

 great numbers on the islands off the coast of Yezzo and wintering in 

 Southern Japan (Blakiston and Pryer, Trans. As. Soc. Japan, 1882, 

 p. 92) . It is possibly to an immature or winter example of this species 

 that the bird obtained by the Siebold Expedition at Nagasaki, and 



