346 BIEDS OF NORFOLK. 



Py craft; took the remains of a small bird wliicli lie 

 believed to be a lark. 



Mr. Booth mentions having- seen this species several 

 times off Yarmouth, and once on Hickling Broad, in 

 immature plumage, but only on one occasion did he ever 

 meet with it in mature dress; this was on the 27th 

 October, 1872, off the entrance to Yarmouth harbour; 

 the example being in perfect adult plumage, but too 

 wary to admit of his getting within range for a shot.'^ 



STERCORARIUSt CATARRHACTES (Limiseas). 

 GREAT SKUA. 



This species, which is decidedly rare on our coast, 

 appears accidentally quite independent of weather, 

 but its visits, few and far between, are almost in- 

 variably in the autumn months. Sir Thomas Browne, 

 in his manuscript " Account of Birds found in Norfolk," 

 says : " In hard winters I have also met with that large 

 and strong-billed fowle wch Clusius describeth by the 

 name of Skua Hoyeri, sent him from the Faro island by 

 Hoierus, a physitian, one whereof was shot at Hickling 

 while 2 thereof were feeding upon a dead horse." J 



Sir W. Hooker's MS., presumably referring to S. ca- 

 tarrhactes, records the occurrence of " four skua gulls " 

 shot off Yarmouth, on October 7th, 1827. Hunt, in his 

 " List," speaks of this species under the name " Larus 



* A gull purchased by Mr. Gurney at the sale of the Miller 

 collection, and long believed to be an ivory gull, proved, Mr. 

 Gurney tells me, on careful examination to be a white-pluraaged 

 glaucous gull. 



f The name Lestris, used by Yarrell, has to give place to the 

 older term Stercorarius, bestowed by Brisson. 



J There can be no doubt from the description given by Clusius, 

 though his figure is very rude (" Exotica," p. 367), that Holer's 

 " Skua" was the bird which the Feeroese still call by the same 

 name, though in modern times spelt " Skuir" (See "Zoologist," 

 1872, p. 3290). 



