138 



upper surface of phalanges between the articulations yellowish ; this 

 color, though generally more conspicuous in the dried specimens, 

 cannot always be perceived in them, but I have always found it in 

 recent ones. The female is precisely similar and can only be recog- 

 nized by dissection. On examining a number of individuals, the 

 colors are found to vary somewhat from the above description, and 

 late in summer the margins of all the feathers become much lighter, 

 except on the head and neck ; the tips of the wings and tail much 

 worn and very faded ; the brown of the head and neck duller, with 

 little or no appearance of the ferruginous or olive hue seen in the 

 spring specimens. The winter plumage differs principally from that 

 of spring in the throat, fore-neck, and sides of the head being white. 

 This is not separated from the dark color of the upper parts by a sharp 

 line, but is gradually, as it were, shaded into it ; it commences on the 

 side of the lower mandible, about half way from the rictus to the ' 

 nostril, passing a short distance below the eye, then upwards and 

 backwards so as to form a widely interrupted collar on the hind-neck, 

 then downwards and forwards, cutting off the dark color of the neck 

 in a point on the sides, and marking its limits in summer plumage ; 

 a long, narrow triangular streak of dusky, bounded above by the 

 feather furrow, runs backward from the eye, surrounded by the 

 white described above. 



The young in winter plumage can only be distinguished from the 

 adults by the shorter and more slender bill. The distribution of the 

 colors in the downy plumage, is precisely similar to that of the adult 

 in winter plumage ; the bristly termination of many of the downy 

 feathers of the posterior part of head and hind-neck white. 



In comparing Labrador with European specimens no difference 

 can be seen in their proportions ; the color of the latter, however, is 

 generally lighter, but this may depend on the season when they were 

 procured, or on locality, the lightest specimens are from France ; those 

 from the Orkney Islands rather darker, and a single specimen from 

 the Faroe Island is quite as dark if not darker than any of those from 

 Labrador. The specimens from Greenland cannot be distinguished 

 in any way. 



Habitat. In summer, from the Bay of Fundy northwards ; speci- 

 mens were procured by Capt. Ross as far north as lat. 81. The most 

 southern locahty in which it is known to breed at present, on our 

 Atlantic coast, is near Seal Island, off the southern end of Nova 

 Scotia. Its most favorite breeding-places south of the Straits of 

 Belle Isle, are the Funk Islands, off the coast of Newfoundland, Bird 

 Rock near the Magdalen Islands, in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and 

 a number of small islands generally called Murre Rocks, between 

 Meccatina and the Esquimaux Islands on the north shore of the 

 Gulf In winter it is abundant on the coast of Maine, and not at all 



