INTRODUCTION 3 



tion is the northern species, or, as it might not inaptly be 

 called, the Atlantic Gannet. Assuredly it has a special 

 interest for every Englishman, not only because it is par 

 excellence a British species, but because we can verify its 

 having bred in tliis country no less than 633 years ago 

 {temp. Edward I.), as will be shown in the account of Lundy 

 Island. Up to the present, one attempt only has been 

 made to split Sula hassana into two species, and that was 

 many years ago by Prince Bonaparte, who, for reasons 

 which do not appear to have been given, called the trans- 

 atlantic Gannet Sula americana* This name is not 

 recognised by any of the naturalists of the United States, 

 but according to Professor Macgillivray, American Gannets 

 are the largest, a difference which by itself could hardly 

 be specific. Gannets with black tails have also received 

 the name of Sula lefevri, Baldamus {cf. "Naumannia," 1851, 

 Part IV., p. 38, note), but it will be shown in Chapter XIII. 

 that this is only the last remains of immaturity, and 

 that such birds are not to be confounded with an allied 

 species inhabiting South Africa, even though for a short 

 period of their lives they are almost indistinguishable from 

 them. 



* "List of the Birds of Europe and North America," 1838, p. 60. The 

 practice of piibhshing n?w specific names in any form without giving 

 descriptions is objectionable. 



B 2 



