1887-88.] Recent Notes on the Great Auk. 109 



Washington. National Museum. — There is only one specimen in this 

 museum, and not two, as previously recorded. See ' The Auk,' vol. 

 iii., No. 2, p. 263. 



Skeletons. 



There are twelve, or perhaps fifteen, additional skeletons of 

 Alca impennis to record, besides those mentioned in ' The 

 Great Auk,' &c., p. 82 ; and of the two mummy specimens 

 said to exist in Harvard University Museum of Comparative 

 Zoology, Cambridge, Mass., United States, one has to be de- 

 leted, as only one is preserved there. The following are par- 

 ticulars of these specimens : — 



British Isles. 



Durham. In the collection of Dr Tristram, Canon of Durham. — I 

 am indebted to the Kev. H. H. Slater, Irchester Vicarage, Welling- 

 boro', for the following information (see below under Wellingboro'). 

 One skeleton. 



Edinburgh. Museum of Science and Art. — Mr Wm. Eagle Clarke 

 informed me, 28th August 1888, that Dr E. H. Traquair, F.E.S., has 

 just acquired from Mr Edward Gerrard, jun., for the Museum, a very 

 tine skeleton of Alca impennis. I have been unable to ascertain its 

 history, so it may be one of those already recorded changing hands. 



Wellingboro'. In the collection of the Rev. H. H. Slater, Irchester 

 Vicarage. — I am indebted to Mr Wm. Eagle Clarke of the Museum of 

 Science and Art, Edinburgh, for first mentioning this skeleton to me, 

 and for advising me to communicate with the Rev. H. H. Slater, who 

 kindly sent me the following. Writing on 2d September 1885, he 

 says : "The skeleton of Alca impennis in my possession was acquired 

 thus. It is, as you surmise, part of the Funk Island find (Pi'of. J. 

 Milne's). I was stopping at Dr Tristram's house in or about the year 

 1877, and he had just received a box of Great Auk bones, as far as I 

 remember from Gerrard. Dr Tristram (I mean the Canon of Dur- 

 ham, not the Chancellor and Q.C.) asked me to look over them, and 

 make him up a skeleton. I did so, being at the time in good practice 

 with birds' bones, and made him a very good one, only a few vertebrae, 

 ribs, and phalanges being absent. As Dr Tristram did not care to 

 keep the rest of the bones, which would make a very fair skeleton 

 also, I became their possessor. His skeleton is some degrees better 

 than mine. His has a good vertebral column." 



Germany. 



Breslau. — In addition to the foregoing, it is just possible there may 

 be still another skeleton to record in Germany, as will be seen from 

 the following communication Professor Wm. Blasius of Brunswick 

 sent me on 31st October 1887 : "I lately got some information from 

 Breslau, according to which there may still exist a skeleton of Alca." 

 VOL. II. H 



