10 



BIRDS OF KERGUELEN ISLAND. 



List of specimens, ivith measurements. 



Bill black. 



Iris very dark steel blue. 



Body generally dark-brown, mottled with black; basal parts of pri- 

 maries showing as a broad white band beneath the wings during flight. 

 Back sparingly mottled with dirty white. A single white feather often 

 found near and below carpal joint of wing, among the coverts. Second 

 primary longest. Considerable differences in general tint were observed, 

 even in the same pair, some being very much paler than others. Stom- 

 ach muscular; contents not identified, except in one case, when bits of 

 egg-shell were found. 



Tarsus and foot greenish slaty-black, scutellated. Claws black, long, 

 and strongly hooked. 



There being no land-birds on Kergueleu Island besides Chionis, the 

 office and most of the habits of a buzzard-hawk have been assumed by 

 this great skua. It was at first taken for a hawk by all of us ; its man- 

 ner of flight, watchfulness of the ground over which it flew, and habit 

 of perching on spots commanding a wide view all suggesting this impres- 

 sion. It was, indeed, difficult to believe the evidence of my own senses 

 ■when I found a web-footed bird avoiding the water and preying solely, 

 so far as my observation extended, upon other birds. When any of the 

 party went out shooting, he was pretty sure to be followed by one or 

 two "sea-hens", as the sealers call them, and had often to be very 

 prompt to secure his game before it should be carried off in his very 

 presence. Mr. Train tells me that he had one day to stand, while re- 

 loading, with his foot upon a teal which he had shot, a skua swooping 

 down constantly after it if he stepped away even for a couple of yards. 

 On another occasion (October 21), the same gentleman had crippled a 

 teal, which was carried off, still living and not badly hurt, before his 



