670 IVORY GULL. 



Europe down to the mouth of the Somme in France, and is said to 

 have occurred near Lausanne in Switzerland ; but even during the 

 cold months it is only a straggler southward of the Arctic circle, 

 and was not identified in Iceland until April 1879. In the high 

 northern latitudes it is now known to be completely circumpolar in 

 its range, for the recent American expeditions to Point Barrow and 

 Bering Sea met with it in those parts — where it had not previously 

 been observed, though tolerably common on the Asiatic coast and 

 off the islands to the northward. Almost all the Arctic explorers 

 have recorded it; Richardson found it breeding in about 122° W. 

 long. ; Sir Leopold M'Clintock obtained a single egg (now in the 

 Dublin Museum) from a nest on Prince Patrick's Island in 116° W. ; 

 and Col. Feilden saw a pair on a lofty and inaccessible cliff in Smith 

 Sound, on August i6th 1875. ^'^ Baffin Bay it is plentiful, and 

 adults as well as immature birds are annually obtained in Greenland ; 

 while in winter they appear to wander as far south as New Bruns- 

 wick. The best known breeding-places are, however, in Spitsbergen 

 and Franz-Josef Land, and the bird doubtless nests in the west and 

 north of Novaya Zemlya, where Capt. A. H. Markham, R.N., 

 found it plentiful. 



The nest, composed of moss, sea-weed and drift, is placed on 

 ledges of precipices, or on the ground a little above high-water 

 mark, according to convenience ; the eggs, which never exceed 2 

 in number, are very similar to those of L. canus, and measure 

 about 2*5 by 17 in. In 'The Ibis,' 1888, pp. 440-443, Prof. R. 

 CoUett has given a description of a fine series, with a coloured 

 illustration of two eggs and of a downy nestling. The food con- 

 sists largely of marine animals and the droppings of walruses and 

 seals, but the ' krang ' or flensed carcases of whales &c. are greedily 

 devoured. Col. Feilden says that this bird has a shrill note, not 

 unlike that of the Arctic Tern, and also that in its flight it re- 

 sembles a Tern rather than a Gull. 



The adult in summer has the entire plumage white, slightly rosy 

 in life ; the bill greenish-grey at the base ; legs and feet black, the 

 hind-toe strongly developed and connected with the tarsus by a 

 well-defined web. Length of a male 18 in., wing 13 in. ; the female 

 is smaller. The young bird is dark grey on the face and chin, and 

 is spotted with black on the back, wing-coverts, tips of the primaries 

 and tail-feathers, as well as on the upper and under tail coverts. 

 The downy nestling is white. 



