572 LARIDiE. 



brilliancy according to age and season ; claws black. The 

 whole length of the specimen here figured and described 

 fourteen inches and a half to the end of the tail ; the wing, 

 from the carpal joint to the end of the first quill-feather 

 eleven inches. Males are rather larger and brighter in 

 colour than the females. 



In birds which are not fully mature, the black loral streaks 

 are less defined ; the grey of the forehead and throat is less 

 pronounced, and the general tint is browner. Birds of the 

 first year have very little white on the forehead ; the mantle 

 and wing-coverts are of a lighter brown, the secondaries and 

 tail-feathers showing slight bars of umber-brown near the 

 tips ; under parts pale brown. 



The Editor considers that there is only one species of 

 large Noddy, to which about a dozen different specific names 

 have been applied ; Mr. R. B. Sharpe distinguishes in 

 addition to the above : — Anous superciliosus of the coast of 

 Central America and the Antilles; A. pliimbeigularis of the 

 Red Sea; and A. gahipdr/eusis of the Galapagos Archipelago 

 (Phil. Trans, clxviii. pp. 463-469). The genus also contains 

 two very distinct and smaller species: — A. mdanogcnys and 

 A. tenuirostrls, the former having a wide intertropical range ; 

 the latter restricted, so far as is known, to the district between 

 the Red Sea and Australia ; and a doubtfully distinct species, 

 A. leucocapillus, occurs in Australian and Polynesian waters. 

 There are also two small and very closely- allied grey-mantled 

 species : — A. caruleiis of the tropical Pacific, and A. cinereus 

 of Eastern Australasia. 



