GULLS AND TERNS. 267 
sense birds of prey. They attack other sea-birds 
and rob them of the food they have secured by 
honorable effort. This, of course, makes them over- 
bearing, fierce, and like, in their ignoble features, our 
inland preying birds. These birds are in the northern 
hemisphere, largely confined to the arctic regions, 
coming southward in winter. 
Moseley, writing of these birds as seen by him in 
the South Atlantic, says, “ The skua is a gull which 
has acquired a sharp curved beak and sharp claws 
at the tips of its webbed toes. The birds are thor- 
oughly predaceous in their habits, quartering their 
ground on the lookout for carrion, and assembling 
in numbers where there is anything killed in the 
same curious way as vultures.” They not only rob 
the gulls, but one species eats birds, which they drag 
from their nests in the ground. 
Of true gulls and their dainty cousins, the terns, 
there are nearly twoscore species. They are much 
alike in habits, yet vary exceedingly in size. In 
plumage, too, there is great variation; but notwith- 
standing this, there is a family likeness that is un- 
mistakable. A tern is a small gull, and a gull an 
overgrown tern. The differences between Larus and 
Sterna are plain enough to the specialist, but do not 
stand out so prominently as to catch the eye of the 
casual observer. George Ord, in his edition of Wil- 
son, referring to the advantages of seezzg rather than 
reading of or hearing about birds, says of sea-gulls,— 
«The zealous inquirer would find himself amply compensated for 
all his toil by observing these neat and clean birds coursing along 
the rivers and coast, enlivening the prospect by their airy movements: 
