GARDENER-BIRD—GARE-FOWL 303 
Structurally the Gannet presents many points worthy of note, 
such as its closed nostrils, its aborted tongue, and its toes all 
connected by a web—characters which it possesses in common 
with most of the other members of the group of birds (STEGANO- 
PODES) to which it belongs. But more remarkable still is the 
system of subcutaneous air-cells, some of large size, pervading 
almost the whole surface of the body, communicating with the 
lungs, and capable of being inflated or emptied at the will of the 
bird. This peculiarity has attracted the attention of several 
writers—Montagu, Sir R. Owen (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1831, p. 90), and 
Macgillivray ; but a full and particular account of the anatomy of 
the Gannet is still to be desired. 
In the southern hemisphere the Gannet is represented by two 
nearly allied but somewhat smaller forms—one Sula capensis, in- 
habiting the coast of South Africa, and the other, S. serrator, the 
Australian seas. Both much resemble the northern bird, but the 
former seems to have a permanently black tail, and the latter a 
tail the four middle feathers of which are blackish-brown with 
white shafts. 
Apparently inseparable from the Gannets generically are the 
smaller birds well known to sailors by the name of Boosy, which 
has passed into an English byword, though few know its Por 
tuguese origin. 
GARDENER-BIRD, see BowEr-Birp. 
GARE-FOWL! (Icelandic, Geirfugl; Gaelic, Gearbhul), the 
anglicized form of the Hebridean name of a large sea-bird, for- 
perhaps fallacious. It seems to be certain that in former days fishes, and 
herrings in particular, were at least as plentiful as now, if not more so, notwith- 
standing that Gannets were more numerous. Those frequenting the Bass were 
reckoned by Macgillivray at 20,000 in 1831, while in 1869 they were computed 
at 12,000, showing a decrease of two-fifths in 38 years. On Ailsa in 1869 there 
were supposed to be as many as on the Bass, but their number was estimated at 
10,000 in 1877 (Report on the Herring Fisheries of Scotland, 1878, pp. xxv. and 
171),—being a diminution of one-sixth in eight years, or nearly twice as great as 
on-the Bass. The falling-off has since been still greater, but I have no means of 
computing it. 
1 “Avis Gare dicta, Corvo Marino Similis, Ovo maximo” is included in 
Sibbald’s treatise De Animalibus Scotiw (p. 22), published in 1684, being the 
first printed notice of this bird as British, and apparently on information 
derived from a MS. description of the Western Islands by Dean Munro, drawn 
up about 1549 (cf. J. A. Smith, Proc. Soc. Antig. Scotl. xiii. p. 84, and xiv. 
p. 4386). A modified, not to say corrupt, version of a transcript of this MS., 
now in the Advocates’ Library at Edinburgh, was printed in 1809 by Pinkerton 
(Coll. Voy. and Trav. iii. p. 730), who used the same spelling. In 1698 Martin 
(Voy. to St. Kilda, p. 48) had the name ‘‘Gairfowl.” Sir R. Owen, in 1864, 
adopted the form ‘‘ Garfowl,” without, as would seem, any precedent authority. 
Mr. Alexander Carmichael (Harvie-Brown and Buckley, Vertebr. Faun. Outer 
