84 OCEAN BIRDS. 



Describing this bird Yarrell, in 'British Birds' (voL iii.), says: — "The bird is said to 

 form a rude nest of grass and moss, which is placed on a tuft in marshes, or on a rock, 

 and to Lay two or three eggs ; these, as figured by Naumann and Buhle, are of a uniform 

 pale green, the larger end blotched and spotted with two shades of reddish-brown ; the 

 length two inches three lines, by one inch six lines and a half in breadth. In the young 

 bird the cere and base of the bill are greenish-brown, the curved point black ; the irides 

 very dark brown ; feathers of the head and neck clove-brown, with narrow margins of 

 wood-brown ; back, scapulars, tertials, and upper tail-coverts umber-brown, each feather 

 margined with wood-brown, these margins being broadest on the tertials, the lower part 

 of the back, and the upper tail-coverts; great wing-coverts nearly uniform umber-brown; 

 wing-primaries blackish-brown, the shafts of these feathers, and a considerable portion 

 of the inner webs white ; tail-feathers umber-brown, the two middle tail-feathers in this 

 young bird not more than half an inch longer than the nest-feather on each side ; chin, 

 throat, breast, belly, and vent mottled with buff-coloured brown, produced by narrow 

 alternate transverse lines of clove-brown and wood-brown ; under tail-coverts broadly 

 barred across with umber-brown and wood-brown ; legs and base of the toes yellow, 

 anterior part of the toes and their intervening membranes black. The whole length of 

 this bird to the end of the tail-feathers next the central pair, twenty inches ; wing 

 from the anterior bend, fourteen inches and a quarter. The comparative measurements 

 in an adult bird would be twenty-one inches, and fifteen inches. 



" I have seen a specimen of the Pomarine Skua in the collection of Mr. Bond, which 

 was obtained alive when a young bird in the varied plumage of its first year, which 

 assumed the uniform chocolate-brown plumage during its second year; some specimens 

 barred across the breast have been named Lcstris striatus, as noticed by Mr. Eyton, and 

 I have seen two fine old birds, dove-grey on the back, with the head black, the neck all 

 round and the breast yellowish-white, with the central feathers elongated, showing that the 

 Pomarine Skua is subject to all the changes of plumage which have been so frequently 

 observed in the more common species, Kichardson's Skua." 



Eichardson's Skua (Stcrcorarius crepidatus). — This bird generally goes by the name of 

 the " Arctic Skua," referring to which fact Seebohm says it is the least Arctic of all the 

 Skuas. It is also sometimes called the "Parasitic Gull,"* concerning which Mr. Salmon 

 gays: — "It is very amusing to see this bird chasing the Kittiwake, which it compels to 

 disgorge its food, and before this food reaches the water or land this pirate-bird catches 



* Though oue would imagiue this name should be given to Bufifou's Skua (5. jnimsUicim). 



