348 BIRDS OF TUNISIA 



as possible under any herbage or long grass it may find available, 

 sometimes making a tunnel-like passage or approach to the nest under 

 the plants. The nest itself is merely a depression in the ground, 

 sometimes bare, at others lined with a few grass-bents. Blanc says 

 he never found more than one egg in a nest, but the usual complement 

 appears to be two or three. The eggs are usually elongate, and of 

 a buff-colour, varying in shade from yellowish to light brown, with 

 grey shell-marks and dark brown surface-spots and blotches. Average 

 measurements 45 X 30 mm. 



STERNA MINUTA, LinUcEUs. 

 LITTLE TEEN. 



Sterna minuta, Linn. Syst. Nat. i, p. 228 (1766) ; Malherbe, Faune 

 Orn. de I'Alg. p. 35 (1855) ; Koenig, J. f. 0. 1888, p. 287 ; id. J.f. 0. 

 1893, p. 98 ; Saunders, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus. xxv, p. 116. 



Sternula minuta, Loche, Expl. Sci. Alg. Ois. ii, p. 204 (1867). 



Description. — Adult male, spring, from Tunis, North Tunisia. 



Forehead white ; lores, crown and nape jet black ; mantle, back, 

 scapulars, secondaries and upper wing-coverts pearl-grey ; edge of wing 

 white ; primaries grey, with white margins to the inner webs, the outer- 

 most primary blackish, with a whitish margin to the inner web ; shafts dark ; 

 rump and upper tail-coverts white, washed with light grey ; tail pure white 

 and slightly forked ; under parts pure white. 



Iris dark brown ; bill yellow, tipped with black ; feet orange. 



Total length 10 inches, wing 6-85, culmen 1-20, tarsus -60. 



Adult female similar to the male. 



Young, forehead, lores and crown pale greyish-brown, the latter streaked 

 with black ; nape and a broad stripe extending from the eye backward 

 blackish ; neck, rump, upper tail-coverts and entire underparts white ; back 

 and most of the upper wing-coverts pale greyish-brown, with blackish 

 margins to the feathers ; primary quills with dark shafts, and slate-grey 

 outer webs, that of the outermost rather darker than the others, the inner 

 webs with the half adjoining the shafts blackish, the other half white. 



The Little Tern is abundant in Tunisia during the spring and 

 summer, and breeds both in the north and south of the Eegency. It 

 leaves, however, in autumn, and does not winter in the country. 



