G ULLE T—G YMNORHINA 403 



to Europe and fourteen to North America, of which (excluding 

 stragglers) some five only are common to both countries. Our 

 knowledge of the geographical distribution of several of them is 

 still incomplete. Some have a very wide range, others very much 

 the reverse : as "witness L. fuliginosus, believed to be confined to the 

 Galapagos, and L. scopulinus and L. hulleri to New Zealand — the 

 last indeed perhaps only to the South Island. The largest species 

 of the group are the Glaucous and Greater Black-backed Gulls, L. 

 glaucics and L. marinus, of which the former is circumpolar, and the 

 latter nearly so — not having been hitherto foimd between Labrador 

 and Japan. The smallest species is the Euroj)ean L. minutus, though 

 the North-American L. Philadelphia does not much exceed it in size. 

 Many of the Gulls congregate in vast numbers to breed, whether 

 on rocky cliffs of the sea -coast or on heathy islands in inland 

 waters. Some of the settlements of the Black-headed or " Peewit " 

 Gull, L. ridibundus, are a source of no small profit to their proprietors, 

 — the eggs, which are accounted a delicacy, being often taken 

 on an orderly system up to a certain day, and the birds carefully 

 protected. Ross's or the Roseate Gull, Rhodosteihia rosea, forms a 

 well-marked genus, distinguished not so much by the pink tint of 

 its plumage (for that is found in other species) but by its small 

 Dove-like bill and wedge-shaped tail. It used to be an exceedingly 

 scarce bird in collections ; but it was met with abundantly in the 

 autumn of 1881 off Point Barrow by Mr. Miudoch of the United 

 States' Polar Expedition {Report, &c., p. 123, pis. i. ii.), and a large 

 series of specimens was obtained. Its Ai'ctic home, however, has 

 not yet been found, but it has been seen, if not procured, in 

 summer in Boothia Felix, and ofi" the coast of Spitsbergen and on 

 Franz Josef Land. More rare still is one of the sjiecies of Xema, 

 X. furcatum, of Avhich only five specimens, all but one believed to 

 have come from the Galapagos, have been seen. Its smaller 

 congener Sabine's Gull, X. sabinii, is more common, and has been 

 found breeding both in Arctic America and in Siberia, and many 

 examples, chiefly immature birds, have been obtained in the British 

 Islands. Both species of Xema are readily distinguished from all 

 other Gulls by their foi'ked tail. 



GULLET, see Oesophagus. 



GWILLEM, see Guillemot, 



GYMNORHINA, G. R. Gray's name in 1840 (List Gen. B. 

 p. 37) for a genus apparently allied to Strepera and belonging to the 

 '■'■ Austro-Coraces" of Parker (Trans. Zool. Soc. ix. p. 327), a group 

 of birds that has not yet been properly defined. They have fre- 

 quently been called " Crow-Shrikes," or, from their loud voice, 

 "Piping Crows," while dealers know them as " Australian Magpies," 



