ALCID^E — THE AUKS — URIA. 487 



It is alleged by Thieneinann and others that there are always distinctive differences 

 to be found between its eggs and those of either troile or ringvia. But of this I am 

 not able to find any satisfactory evidence. This is, if anything, the more Arctic 

 species ; and where found in more northern latitudes appears to be much more 

 abundant than the troile. 



Near Horn Sound, Spitzbergen, Messrs. Evans and Sturge met with it in immense 

 numbers. The birds were in company with the Little Auk, and flew about in large 

 flocks, settling close around the vessel, playing and diving in all directions, and 

 seeming to be quite regardless of the presence of intruders, keeping up all the while 

 a shrill chattering. 



It is also much more abundant in the North Pacific and Behring Sea, where the 

 ringvia has not been observed, and where the troile has been rarely met with. Mr. 

 Dull mentions it as not uncommon at Kadiak, and abundant at St. George's, where 

 it breeds in immense numbers on the perpendicular cliffs. It is not. given as occurring 

 in the Aleutian Islands. 



Mr. Henry W. Elliott states that this species — the great Egg-bird of the Ninth 

 Pacific — frequents the Prybilof Islands by millions. This Uria and one other, the 

 !'. californica, are the only birds of this genus found there. They appear very early 

 in the season, but do not begin to lay until the 18th or 25th of June ; and in open, 

 mild winters these birds are said to be seen in straggling flocks all around the islands. 

 He considers it certain that the birds of this species do not all migrate from that sea 

 and the vicinity of the Aleutian Islands. They lay their eggs upon the points and 

 narrow shelves on the faces of the cliff-fronts to the islands, making no nests, but 

 standing over the eggs, side by side, as thickly as they can be crowded together. They 

 quarrel desperately, and so earnestly that all along the high bluffs on the north shore 

 of St. George's hundreds of dead birds are lying, having been killed by falling on to 

 the rocks while clinched in combat with rivals in mid-air. The birds lay but a single 

 egg on the bare rock. The egg is large and very fancifully colored, having a bluish 

 green ground with dark-brown mottlings and patches; but it is exceedingly variable 

 in size and coloring. The outline of the egg is pyriform, and sometimes more acute. 

 This is the most palatable of all the varieties found on the islands, having no disagree- 

 able flavor, and when perfectly fresh being fully as good as a Hen's egg. Incubation 

 lasts nearly twenty-eight days, and the young come out with a dark thick coat of 

 down, which within six weeks from hatching is supplanted by the plumage and color 

 of the old birds. They are fed by the disgorging of the parents, apparently without 

 intermission, and utter all the while a harsh, rough, and decidedly lugubrious croak. 



On St. George's Island, while the females begiu to sit, toward the end of June and 

 first of July, the males go flying around, at regular hours in the morning and evening, 

 in great files and platoons, always circling against or quartering on the wind, forming 

 a dark girdle of birds more than a quarter of a mile broad and thirty miles long, 

 whirling round and round the island. The flight of the " Arrie " is straight, steady, 

 and rapid, the wings beating quickly and powerfully. It makes no noise, and 

 utters no cry, save a low, hoarse, grunting croak, and that only when quarrelling 

 or mating. 



Captain W. H. Feilden (" Ibis," October, 1877) observed two individuals of this 

 species in August as far north as Buchanan's Strait (lat. 79° N.), but it was not seen 

 again until the return of the Expedition southward in September, 1876, after regain- 

 ing navigable waters south of Cape Sabine. The north waters of Baffin's Bay appeared 

 to be the northern limits of the species in this direction, nor were there any breeding- 

 places north of Cape Alexander. 



