450 



Length eight and a half inches (French) ; tarsus eighteen lines. 

 Bill ten lines, with the nasal tube recurved : feet remarkably broad, 

 without yellow spots: tail perfectly even. The colors are the same as 

 in the other specimens on which I established the species ; there is 

 no white on the wings, but the lower parts from the breast, including 

 the flank6, are pure white, (the other, if I recollect right, though 

 we remarked that even in that state, it had more white than any 

 other, was merely varied with white), with the exception of the tips 

 of the lower coverts and femorals : a few white feathers appear also 

 on the throat, the bottom of the plumage of which, as well as that 

 of the breast is, moreover, pure white, leading us to suspect that 

 those parts may become entirely white according to season. The 

 outer tail feather is also white at base, as well as the shaft : the 

 same thing is observed in Thalassidroma pelagica, but the shaft is 

 black even in the white. The principal and most remarkable cha- 

 racter, however, of this species, a character which I also observed 

 in the other specimen, but did not notice, fearing it to be artificial, 

 is the following : 



The nails are plane, (quite flat) dilated and rounded at tip, quite 

 different from those of the other species, though a slight tendency to 

 that form is observable in Th. wilsonii, and somewhat resembling 

 those of the species of the genus Podiceps. 



Shall we place in a separate group an account of this remarkable 

 anomaly, a bird which in all other respects is a decided Thalassi- 

 droma ? According to Temm. this species is the Procellaria ma- 

 rina, (verbal communication) but judging from Vieillot's plate and 

 description in the Gal. des Ois. pi. 292. even making allowance for 

 the white, we cannot admit such an identity, though the birds are 

 certainly much alike. 



Note 28. Our 35th Family (Lobipedes) must be abolished. Of 

 the two genera which composed it, the first, Podoa, belongs de- 

 cidedly to the Steganopodes ; and the other, Podiceps, no less cer- 

 tainly to the Pygopodcs , and in a natural arrangement should not 

 be separated from Colymbus, any more than Podoa from Plotus. 

 Our apology for proposing this artificial group, may be found in the 

 remains of a prejudice in favour of the long since established Order 

 of Pinnatipedcs. Latham was the first to force into that most un- 

 natural assemblage, the three genera Podiceps, Fulica, and Pha- 



