264 Lord Lilford— A'o^e^ on 



the 24th_, and, in spite of an accident to liis gun, brought back 

 thirty-four " fowl '' as his share of the day's bag, consisting 

 of Anas chjpeata, A. acuta, A. querquedula, A. crecca, 

 Mareca penelope, FuVujula ferina, and a fine adult specimen 

 of the Common Heron {Ardea cinerea) alive, slightly wounded 

 in the pinion-joint, Avhich we added to our floating mena- 

 gerie. 



We left Valencia on the morning of ]\Iarch 25th, and 

 steamed into Port Mahon, against a very heavy head sea, the 

 next day about noon ; there we were detained by a very 

 heavy north-easterly gale which blew without cessation till 

 the evening of 30th. The only birds noticed about the har- 

 bour were Kites {Milvus ictinus), an Osprey, one Buzzard 

 [Buteo vulgaris), many Gulls, all of which were the iSIedi- 

 terranean Herring Gull {Lams cachinnans) , and some Shags 

 {Phalacrocoi'ax gracidus) . We steamed out of the harbour 

 on the evening of the 30th, with no wind, but a long rolling 

 sea, passed through flocks of certainly some thousands of 

 both species of Shearwater, at the entrance of the harbour, 

 and noticed, some miles off the land, a solitary Puffin [Frater- 

 cula arctica), to the best of my recollection the first of this 

 species ever seen by ns in the ]\Iediterranean. Our destination 

 was Spezia, and at noon of the 31st we made the high land 

 of Asinai'a, at the N.W. extremity of Sardinia ; the sea had 

 entirely gone down, and the weather was bright and balmy. 

 Several Kedbreasts, apparently tired out, boarded us during 

 the day, and on this day we met with the first Black-headed 

 Gull {Larus melanocephalus) seen by us during this cruise. 

 I am by no means inclined to enter into the never-ending 

 question of scientific ornithological nomenclature, but I must 

 make a protest against the obvious but almost universal mis- 

 application of the English words '"'Black-headed^' to Larus 

 ridibundus, a species which at no period of its existence has 

 any black about the head, and for which I venture to suggest 

 " Laughing Gull '^ as a much more appropriate designation. 

 '' Adriatic '' is, though not quite so inappropriate, a vague 

 and unsatisfactory term as applied to L. melanocephalus, 

 which is a common species in all but the extreme w^estern 



