458 BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 



and in the Atlantic on. the 12th of June, lat. 41° S., long. 

 34^'' W., a few were still hovering round the ship. 



The sexes are precisely alike. 



Forehead, lores, cheeks, throat, centre of the chest, and all 

 the under surface white; narrow space beneath the eye, 

 shoulders, and the outer webs of the first primaries deep 

 brownish black ; back of the neck, sides of the chest, back, 

 rump, wings and tail grey ; the secondaries, scapularies, and 

 six middle tail-feathers tipped with white ; the two outer tail- 

 feathers almost wholly white, and the shafts of all black ; bill 

 dull blackish brown, with a stripe of blue-grey along the lower 

 part of the under mandible ; tarsi and toes delicate blue ; 

 interdigital membrane flesh-white traversed by red veins. 



Genus PUFFINUS, Brisson. 



The Shearwaters, like many other portions of the family 

 ProcellaridcB, have been much subdivided, and what was but 

 the other day a genus now constitutes a subfamily. The 

 well-known Puffinus anglorum and the P. obscurus are re- 

 garded as typical Puffini, of which form a single species, 

 P. nugax, is found in Australia ; while the P. brevicaudus and 

 P. carneipes are placed in the genus Nedris, and the P. sphe- 

 nurus in TJiiellus. The various members of these divisions 

 differ slightly in their habits. They are all gregarious, and 

 particularly during the breeding-season assemble in immense 

 numbers. 



Sp. 635. PUFFINUS NUGAX. 



Allied Petrel. 

 Procellaria nugax, Sol. MSS. 



Puffinus assimilis, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc, part v. p. 156. 

 nugax, Bonap. Consp. Gen. Av., torn. ii. p. 205. 



Puffinus assimilis, Gould, Birds of Australia, foL, vol. vii. pi. 59. 

 All the specimens of this species that I have seen wei'e pro- 



