PROCELLARIID.E. 



729 



'^-, 



^V 



WILSON'S PETREL. 



OCEANITES OCEANICUS (Kuhl). 



This remarkably long-legged Petrel was noticed and figured as 

 Procellaria pelagica by Wilson (Am. Orn. vii. p. 90, pi. Ix, fig. 6), 

 under the impression that it was identical with the bird just described, 

 but the earliest scientific description of it was given by Kuhl in 1820, 

 In 1824 Bonaparte published a memoir on this and three more species, 

 with the distinctive characters, measurements, and figures of each ; 

 and, in ignorance of Kuhl's name, proposed to call this bird Procel- 

 laria wilsoni, in honour of the distinguished ornithologist, whose 

 name can, however, only be handed down to posterity in the trivial 

 appellation. In his memoir Bonaparte says, " I have never learnt 

 that it has been seen on the coasts of Europe. I killed one, that 

 had probably strayed, near the Azores " ; and this appears to be 

 the first printed notice of the occurrence of Wilson's Petrel on the 

 European side of the Atlantic. As regards the British Islands, 

 Gould observed this species in abundance off the Land's End in 

 May 1838, and in November of the same year the specimen now 

 figured was found dead near Polperro in Cornwall ; an example 

 has been picked up near Chippenham in Wiltshire ; two have been 

 obtained near Freshwater in the Isle of Wight (the last in the 

 autumn of 18S8) ; the late Mr. F. Bond recorded one from Sussex ; 

 one was shot near Halifax in Yorkshire in November 1S74 ; and two 



