THE FOOLISH GUILLEMOT. 569 
mer plumage, with the entire hind and upper parts of body, dark sooty-brown; 
under parts white; head and orbital region dusky, without white stripes. 
Total length, about fifteen inches; wing, seven and a half; tail, two inches. 
Hab. — Northern coasts of America; Northern Europe and Asia. 
This bird is rather common on our coast in the winter 
months, and is said to breed in small numbers about the 
Bay of Fundy. As a general thing, however, it passes the 
season of incubation in more northern localities, and is very 
abundant on the coast of Labrador, where, on the low 
islands, it breeds, laying a single egg, like the Razor-billed 
Auk, on the bare rock or gravel. It is impossible to de- 
scribe the egg of this species in a manner that will lead to 
its being distinguished from that of the Murre or Razor- 
billed Auk. 
Audubon makes the following observations, which are, of 
course, of more value to the collector than to the student, 
who has no opportunities of visiting the breeding-grounds 
of these birds. He says: — 
“The Foolish Guillemot lays only a single egg, which is the 
case with the Thick-billed Guillemot also. The Razor-billed Auk 
lays two, and the Black Guillemot usually three. This is confirmed 
by the fact, that the Foolish Guillemot, which lays only one egg, 
plucks the feathers from its abdomen, which is thus left bare over 
a roundish space, just large enough to cover its single egg. The 
Thick-billed Guillemot does the same. The Auk, on the contrary, 
forms two bare spots, separated by a ridge of feathers. The Black 
Guillemot, to cover her three eggs, and to warm them all at once, 
plucks a space bare quite across her belly.” 
One peculiarity which I notice in the eggs of this species 
and those of the Murre is, that they are generally some- 
what pyriform in shape: but this is not persistent; and-the 
same rock may contain a deep-green egg with brown spots 
and blotches, a light-blue one with hardly any marks, and 
cream-colored ones, drab, reddish-white, and bluish-white, 
some with only a few spots and blotches, and others thickly 
marked. It may also have pyriform eggs, ovoidal, ovate, 
