APPENDIX B. 



THE BOOBIES, OR TROPICAL GANNETS. 



Very nearly allied to the Gannets just named are the Boobies 

 of the tropical seas. In fact in the opinion of most classifiers, 

 including Mr. W. R. Ogilvie-Grant, Dr. E. Hartert, and the late 

 Prof. Newton, they are not generically separable ; but this was 

 not the view taken by Dr. R. B. Sharpe (" Handbook to the Birds 

 of Great Britain," II., p. 218). The Boobies are smaller birds 

 than S. bassana, S. capensis, and S. serrator, and otherwise differ 

 from them; generally they breed on low trees, laying either 

 one or two eggs, and none of them has a strip of bare 

 skin in the front of the neck. There are from seven to ten 

 sorts of these Boobies, according to the views which different 

 ornithologists hold, certain characters being held by some 

 authors to be specific, by others not. 



1. 



Sula dactylatra, Lesson ; S. cyanops (Sundevall) ; S. ahhotti. 

 The Masked Booby. 



Tropical Seas. Breeds on Ascension Island, where Mandelso 

 caught some in 1639 ("Voyage 'Perse,'" livre troisieme), and 

 from whence I have photographs. General colour white, except- 

 ing the wing- and tail-feathers. 



