CHECK LIST OF NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS. 125 



810. Diomedea brachyura Temm. b 631. c 578. R 70i. 



Short-tailed Albatross. 



811. Diomedea nigripes Aud. B — . c 579. R 700. 



Black-footed Albatross. 



812. PhcBbetria faliginosa (Gm.) Coues. b 633. c 580. R 703. 



Sooty Albatross. 



813. Ossifraga gigantea (Gm.) Reich, b 634. C58i. R 704. (!) 



Giant Fulmar. 



814. Fulmarus glacialis (L.) Steph. b 635. c 582. r 705. 



Fulmar. 



815. Fulmarus glacialis pacificus (And.) Coues. b 636. c 5S2a. R 705a. (?) 



Pacific Fulmar. 



816. Fulmarus glacialis rodgersi (Cass.) Coues. B — . c 582&. R 7056. (?) 



Rodgers's Fulmar. 



817. Priocella tenuirostris (Aud.) Ridg. b 637. c 583. R 706. (!) 



Slender-billed Fulmar. 



810. Di-6-me-de'-a brach-y-u'-ra. Lat. Diomedeus, adjective relating to Diomedes or Awix-r^Sris, 



Jove-counselled, a Grecian hero famous at tlie siege of Troy : application probably 

 fanciful. Pliny's Diomedea. aves were birds living on the Island Diomedea in the 

 Adriatic. — Gr. ^paxvs, short, and odpa, tail. 



811. D. nig'-ri-pes. Lat. nirjer, black, and pes, foot. 



812. Phoe-be'-trl-a fu-li-gm-o'-sa. Gr. (poifirjTpia, a prophetess, soothsayer, like (pot$d(TTpia, 



Phaebastria, another genus of this family invented by Reiclienbach ; (poL^aCta is to 

 prophesy ; literally, to " play Apollo " with oracular utterances ; *o?/3os, Phcebus, a 

 synonym of Apollo. These words are with great propriety and correct sentiment 

 applied to albatrosses, the import of whose weird presaging will be felt by one who reads 

 Coleridge's " Antient Mariner," or himself goes down the deep in ships. 



813. Os-si'-fra-ga gi-gan'-t6-a. Lat. ossifragus, bone-breaking, from os, genitive ossis, a bone, 



and frango,! break; in the perfect, fregi, participle/radiw; three forms of the word 

 repeated in English in frangible, fragile, fracture: the Latin digammated from Gr. p-i^yw/ut; 

 the stem here seen giving an immense crop of words. — J^at giganteus, gigantic, giant; 

 the original " giants," gigantes, riyavres. were a race of Titans, who attempted to scale 

 high heaven; they were the sons of Tartarus and Earth; but, being probably illegiti- 

 mate, took the name of their mother ; " gigantic " meaning literally " earth-born," 

 yriyevris ; yrj, and ylyvofxai. 



Only North American as astray on the high sea. 



814. Ful'-ma-riis gla-cl-a'-lis. Fidmarus is arbitrary Latinization of fulmar, which is said to be 



akin to full mart, foulmart, ov foumart, a polecat ; probably ivomfoul (dirty), and the root 

 of the word murder (Wharton's MS.). — Glacialis, see Harelda, No. 728. 



815. F. g. pa-ci'-fi-ciis. See Anortliura, "No. 77. 



816. F. g. r6d'-g€r-si. To Commodore John Rodgers, U. S. Navy. 



817. PrI-6-cel'-la t6n-u-!-ros'-tris. Priocella we do not recognize, miless, perhaps, it is a 



frightful concatenation of Prion and Prorellaria, two well-known genera of this family. 

 French ornithologists were frequently guilty of such atrocities ; see Embernagra, No. 311, 

 for example. Agassiz gives it as Prion and Prorella. Prion is the Gr. irpiiov, a saw, from 

 the prominent teeth of the bill; for Procellaria, see below. — Lat. tenuirostris, slender- 



