FORKED-TAILED PETREL. 523 



head into the water to seize their food, and sometimes keep 

 it longer under than I had expected. The Forked-tailed 

 Petrel, like the other species, feeds chiefly on floating mol- 

 lusca, small fishes, Crustacea, which they pick up among the 

 floating sea-weeds, and greasy substances which they occa- 

 sionally find around fishing-boats, or ships out at sea. When 

 seized in the hand, it ejects an oily fluid through the tubular 

 nostrils, and sometimes disgorges a quantity of food. I 

 could not prevail on any of those which I had caught to take 

 food." It is common on the banks of Newfoundland, and 

 some parts of the coast of North America. 



On the opposite side of the British Channel it has been 

 taken on the coasts of Holland, Belgium, and France. 



The bill is black ; the irides dark brown ; the head, neck, 

 and back sooty black, the back rather the darkest in colour ; 

 wing-coverts rusty brown ; the tertials tipped with white ; 

 upper tail-coverts white ; primaries and tail-feathers black ; 

 the tail forked, the outer feathers being half an inch longer 

 than those in the middle ; breast and belly sooty black ; 

 behind each thigh, and extending over the sides of the vent 

 and lateral under tail-coverts, an elongated patch of white ; 

 the vent and middle under tail-coverts sooty black. 



The whole length of my bird seven inches and a quarter ; 

 from the anterior bend of the wing to the end six inches ; the 

 length of the leg one inch. The sexes in plumage are alike. 



