Capt. Sab ink's Memoir on the Birds of Greenland, ^c. 539 



and occasionally in Baffin's Bay. A specimen killed on the 10th 

 of June had the feathers of the throat mottled with white; from 

 whence I infer that it undergoes the same changes from season 

 as the Uria Troilc. A matured specimen was sent by me to my 

 brother, and reached England towards the close of the summer; 

 several were subsequently brought home by the expedition which 

 visited Spitzbergen, as well as by that which went to Baffin's 

 Bay. 



It is extraordinary that a species so abundant in the Greenland 

 seas should be unnoticed by Fabricius ; it must have escaped 

 his observation altogether, as he has not even mentioned the Uria 

 Troile, for which it might on a slight view be mistaken. Length 

 17 inches — extent 2 feet — weight 21b. 6oz. ; inside of the throat 

 yellow, irides dark; throat and neck sooty brown; head black; 

 hind head, hind neck, back and wings, dark sooty brown ; the 

 wings being lightest, and the secondaries tipt white; the feathers 

 of the head and neck have a peculiar smoothness and softness; 

 from the eye to the hind head is a line occasioned by a division 

 of the feathers ; belly and all beneath pure white, running up to 

 a point in the neck ; the feathers are very thick, and on being 

 removed a dark down appears between them and the skin ; legs 

 marbled, brown and yellowish; claws black; no difference in 

 plumage between the sexes. With the exception of the colour 

 of the dark plumage, this description might be applied to the 

 Foolish Guillemot ; but the specific distinction is well pointed out 

 by Briinnich in the following words: " Lomviae in omnibus simil- 

 lima, excepto rostro latiori et breviori, cujus margines etiam in 

 exsiccatis exuviis flavescunt." The yellow margin extends from 

 the corner of the mouth, along the edge of the upper mandible, 

 to the point to which the feathers project on the bill: it is rather 

 horn-coloured than yellow. Briinnich mentions three other birds, 



VOL. XII. 4 A Nos. 



