504 BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 



Sp. 661. SULA AUSTRALIS, Gould. 



Australian Gannet. 



Bula australis, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc, part viii. p. 177. 



Pelecanus serrator, Banks, Drawings, no. 30. 



Bala serrator, Bonap. Compt. Rend, de I'Acad. Sci., 1856. 



Sula australis, Gould, Birds of Australia, foL, vol. vii. pi. 76. 



It will be clear to every ornithologist that the present 

 species and the Sida bassana of Europe are representatives of 

 each other, and that they are destined by nature to perform 

 similar offices, and to inhabit corresponding zones of latitude 

 in opposite hemispheres. Their habits, actions, and economy 

 are, in fact, so precisely alike, that an account of one species 

 is equally applicable to the other. 



I found the Sula australis generally dispersed over the seas 

 washing the shores of Tasmania, but most numerous on the 

 south side of the island. The Mewstone, the South Cape, the 

 rock at the mouth of D'Entrecasteaux's Channel, and the low 

 Actaeon Islands were tenanted by hundreds during the period 

 of my visit in 1839, and it was also seen, but in less numbers, 

 along the entire coast of South AustraUa. Much as has been said 

 respecting the natural stupidity of other species of the genus 

 Sula — Boobies as they are called, — the present appeared to 

 be the Booby "par excellence^' as evidenced by the manner 

 in which I captured the specimens in my collection. Observ- 

 ing about fifty fine adult birds reposing on the flat top of a 

 low rock on one of the Actaeons, I directed my boatmen to 

 row cautiously that I might endeavour to get a shot at them ; 

 I was soon not only within range, but too near to use my 

 large duck gun, loaded as it was with large shot; I de- 

 termined therefore to shoot them on the wing as they flew 

 from their resting-place ; judge of my surprise when I 

 found that neither the near approach of the boat nor our 

 speaking to each other startled them in the least. Taking one 



