360 THE TUBE-NOSED SWIMMERS — TUBINARES. 



Hab. Oceans of the southern hemisphere, northeastward to the coast of Oregon. (Audubon.) 

 Sp. Char. Adult (?) : Neck, back, and entire lower parts pale smoky ash, lightest on the neck 

 and anterior portion of the back, where the tips of the feathers are nearly white ; pileum clouded 

 with pale yellowish ash and dusky ; sides of the head, including lores, orbital and malar regions, 

 chin, and throat, deep fuliginous, darkest around the eyes, where nearly black. Eyelids whitish. 

 Wings and tail dark slaty fuliginous, the shalts of the primaries and rectrices yellowish, except 

 terminally ; scapulars and rump intermediate in color between the wings and back. Bill black, 

 except the sulci, which are light colored ; legs and feet pale reddish. Young: Entire head deep 

 fuliginous, fading gradually into the uniform smoky gray of the lower surface of the body, the back, 

 ramp, and upper tail-coverts ; scapulars sooty gray, considerably darker than the back ; wings and 

 tail sooty slate, the inner lesser coverts faintly tipped with dull ferruginous, the shafts of the pri- 

 maries and rectrices yellowish white. Eyelids conspicuously white, except anteriorly. Bill and 

 feet colored as in the adult. 



Wing, 20.00-21.50 inches; tail, 10.50-13.00, the lateral feathers 3.00-5.50 shorter; culmen, 

 4.00-4.25 ; depth of bill at base, 1.40-1.55 ; tarsus, 3.25 ; middle toe, 4.00-4.50. 



This species was introduced into the North American fauna by Audubon, who 

 figured and described it as D.fusca — supposing it to be a new species — from an indi- 

 vidual procured by Dr. Townsend near the mouth of the Columbia River. It is a bird 

 of the Pacific Ocean, a great wanderer, more common in the South than in the North 

 Pacific Regions, and with very doubtful claims to be regarded as even a visitor of the 

 North American coast at any point. 



Mr. R. Swinhoe speaks of it as being abundant at all seasons in the Formosan 

 Channel. He kept several birds of this species, as well as of D. albatrus, alive for 

 several days in his veranda at Amoy ; but he could not induce any of them to 

 feed. For a few days they walked about in a clumsy manner, but soon became too 

 weak. He kept one alive, in order to ascertain how long it was possible for this bird 

 to exist without food. It had been kept a week or more when he received it, and it 

 remained alive twenty-nine days after that ; so that it must have lived in all at least 

 five weeks without swallowing anything. 



It was also found about Amoy, China, where it was caught, in company with D. 

 albatrus, by the fishermen, and brought into the market for sale — the flesh, all 

 musk-flavored as it is, being devoured by the omnivorous Chinamen. There it goes 

 by the name of A-haieav^gong, or Booby of Hainan. 



Mr. Layard met with it in the Antarctic Ocean, in lat. 41° S. It was in company 

 with Ossifraga gigantea. The same gentleman, in the " Ibis " (1867), describes an 

 egg that had been obtained by Captain Armson in the Crozette Islands. It measured 

 4.20 inches by 2.60, and resembled generally the egg of D. exulans — being chalky 

 white, coarse to the touch, and of a squarely truncated form. It was also minutely 

 pitted with reddish dots in an indistinct band at the obtuse end. This species is 

 called the " Blue Bird " by the sealers, who readily distinguish it from the equally 

 sooty Giant Petrel by its white eyelids and the white mark along the bill. The 

 female lays but a single egg, which is said to be very good eating. 



Captain P. P. King writes ("Zoologist," XXXIV. 128) that he met with birds 

 of this species in the greatest abundance near the Island of St. Paul. Wherever one 

 species of Diomedea abounded, the others were found to be less common ; and from 

 this he inferred that the three species, D. spadicea, D. chlororhynchos, and P.fuligi- 

 nosa, breed in different haunts. 



This species is given by Mr. G. R. Gray as one of the birds found on the coast of 

 New Zealand. 



< laptain Hutton (" Ibis," 1865) states, on the authority of Mr. Richard Harris, 

 R. N., that this species breeds in the inaccessible cliffs of the Prince Edward Islands 



