956 TERN 
to a genus in which the toes are only half-webbed, and the birds 
of small size and dark leaden-grey plumage. It is without doubt 
the Sterna of Turner, and in former days was abundant in many 
parts of the fen country,} to say nothing of other districts. Though 
nearly all its ancient abodes have been drained, and for its pur- 
poses sterilized these many years past, not a spring comes but it 
shews itself in small companies in the eastern counties of England, 
evidently seeking a breeding-place. All around the coast the 
diminution in the numbers of the remaining species of Terns 
within the last 50 years is no less deplorable than demonstrable. 
The Sandwich Tern, S. sandvicensis or S. cantiaca—named from 
the place of its discovery, though it has long since ceased to inhabit 
that neighbourhood—is the largest of the British species, equalling 
in size the smaller Gulls and having a dark-coloured bill tipped 
with yellow, and dark legs. Through persecution it has been ex- 
tirpated in all its southern haunts, and is become much scarcer in 
those to which it still resorts. It was, however, never so abundant 
as its smaller congeners, the so-called Common and the Arctic Tern, 
—two species that are so nearly alike as to be beyond discrimina- 
tion on the wing by an ordinary observer, and even in the hand 
require a somewhat close examination.? The former of these has 
the more southern range, and often affects inland situations, while 
the latter, though by no means limited to the Arctic circle, is 
widely distributed over the north and mostly resorts to the sea- 
coast. Yet there are localities where, as on the Farne Islands, both 
meet and breed, without occupying stations apart. The minute 
diagnosis of these two species cannot be briefly given. It must 
suffice here to state that the most certain difference, as it is the 
most easily recognizable, is to be found in the tarsus, which in the 
Arctic Tern is a quarter of an inch shorter than in its kinsman. 
The remaining native species is the Lesser Tern, S. minuta, one of 
the smallest of the genus and readily to be distinguished by its per- 
manently white forehead. All the species already mentioned, 
except the Black Tern, have much the same general coloration— 
1 It was known there as Carr-Swallow, Carr-Crow and Blue Darr (qu. = 
Daw 2). 
2 Linneus’s diagnosis of his Sterna hirundo points to his having had an 
** Arctic” Tern before him ; but it is certain that he did not suspect that specific 
appellation (already used by other writers for the ‘‘Common” Tern) to cover a 
second species. Some modern authorities disregard his name as being insufficiently 
definite, and much is to be said for this view of the case. Undoubtedly 
‘“‘hirundo” has now been used so indiscriminately as to cause confusion, which 
is avoided by adopting the epithets of Naumann (Jsis, 1819, pp. 1847, 1848), 
who, acting on and confirming the discovery of Nitzsch (the first detector of the 
specific difference), called the more southern species S. flwviatilis and the more 
northern S. macrura. Temminck’s name, S. arctica, applied to the latter a year 
later, has been until lately most generally used for it, notwithstanding. 
