GREAT BLACK-BACKED GULL. 299 



quills black, slightly greyish at the base, the fourth 

 and fifth black at the tips, with the point white ; 

 bill carmine red ; feet and legs brownish red. 



Plate XXIII. exhibits the Larus melanocephalus, 

 Boye; in this the head is black, and does not extend 

 so far down the front of the neck ; the back of the 

 neck, mantle and wings, very pale grey; quills 

 white at the tips, the outer web of the first black to 

 within two inches of the tip ; the bill orange-red, 

 with a dark band across the angle ; legs and feet 

 brownish red. 



We now have to describe the British series of 

 True Gulls, placing one or two smaller species at 

 the conclusion, as being more exclusively maritime, 

 and in some points assimilating with the petrels 

 with which Ve commenced the family. The True 

 Gulls are mostly of large size, and are almost all 

 distinguished by two colours, pure white covering 

 the head, vent and under parts, and by a darker 

 mantle and wings of some grey shade. One of the 

 largest is 



THE GREAT BLACK-BACKED GULL, LARUS MARI- 

 NUS, Linn. Goeland a nianteau noir, Temm. 

 Black-lacked or Great Black-lacked Gull of British 

 authors. (L. ncemus, the Wagel, youny). This fine 

 species, the largest of our British gulls, is much less 

 frequent than the next bird we shall describe, and 

 for which we think it has been sometimes mistaken, 



