18 BRITISH SEABIRDS. 
brown ; and the tail with a broad sub-terminal band 
of the same colour. The second plumage—assumed 
as soon as the foregoing is completed—retains brown 
marks of immaturity on the scapulars and inner- 
most secondaries; the wing-coverts are streaked 
with brown, and the tail still retains its brown sub- 
terminal band. This plumage is carried until the 
following spring, when the brown hocd—assumed 
for the first time—is mottled with white; the tail- 
band is more or less broken; whilst the scapulars 
and innermost secondaries assume the colour 
peculiar to the adult. For several years the white 
markings on the primaries gradually increase in 
extent until the bird arrives at perfect maturity. 
The larger Gulls—of which the Herring Gull 
may be taken as a typical species—mature much 
more slowly, the perfectly adult plumage not 
being assumed until the bird is four years old. 
The plumage succeeding the downy stage is 
brown on the upper parts, each feather with a pale 
margin, and white on the under parts streaked with 
brown. After each succeeding moult in spring 
and autumn, the traces of immaturity grow less, the 
wing-coverts and tail retaining them longest. The 
white spots on the primaries are the latest signs of 
complete maturity. The colour of the feet, bill, 
iris, and irides, slowly changes until that character- 
istic of the adult is assumed. 
Gulls, popularly speaking, are inseparably associ- 
ated with the sea, yet the haunts of many species, 
