7l6 GREAT SHEARWATER. 



down ' it appears to be well known to the fishermen, who sometimes 

 take it with a hook. 



Mr. Gatke informs me that a flock occurred off Heligoland many 

 years ago, since which time he has only obtained a single example ; 

 but this species has seldom been noticed in the Freroes or Iceland ; 

 however it undoubtedly visits the south of Greenland, though 

 Reinhardt was mistaken in supposing that it bred there. Capt. J. \V. 

 Collins states that it arrives on the fishing-grounds off New England 

 and British Xorth America in May, remaining there till October or 

 November— according to the time of the first snow ; and, although 

 in the course of thirty years' experience in taking these birds for 

 bait he must have seen thousands opened, he never found one which 

 showed any signs of breeding. It traverses the Atlantic and pro- 

 bably resorts to some of the islands in the Southern Ocean for the 

 purposes of reproduction ; specimens having been obtained at 

 Tierra del Fuego, and also near the Cape of Good Hope. In the 

 Azores, as well as on the islets near Madeira and the Canaries, the 

 resident species is P. kuhli (identical with P. borcalis of Cory), 

 which visits the western coasts of France and the Peninsula, and is 

 abundant throughout the Mediterranean; the latter species is of a 

 much paler brown on the upper parts, and has a yellow-coloured 

 and deeper bill. 



Nothing is known of the nidification of the (ireat Shearwater, for 

 the egg from the Madeiran Desertas figured by Hewitson is that 

 of P. kuhli. The food consists chiefly of squid, and Mr. Gurney 

 found the horny jaws of small cuttle-fish in the stomach of a bird shot 

 near Flamborough ; but any animal substance is greedily swallowed, 

 and, as already mentioned, this species is systematically taken with 

 a hook to furnish bait for fish. When alighting it strikes the water 

 with great violence — in a manner quite different from that of a Gull — 

 and then dives ; pursuing its prey under water with great rapidity, 

 and often tearing bait from the fishermen's hooks. When crossing 

 the Atlantic it may be seen skimming the surface of the water 

 without any apparent efl'ort, alternately poised on either wing; but at 

 times it flaps its pinions freely. 



The adult has the bill dark brown ; head and nape ash-brown ; 

 neck whitish, when fully extended in flight ; feathers of the mantle 

 ash-brown with paler edges ; quills and tail-feathers blackish ; tail- 

 coverts mottled brown and white; under parts white, with some pale 

 brown running up the centre of the abdomen and on the thighs ; 

 legs and feet pinkish-white in life, drying yellow. Length i8in. ; 

 wing I -; in. 



