112 CORRESPONDENCE OF RAY. 



feathers appeared white, with red intermixed ; the beak 

 crooked and of a scarlet colour ; their tail at a distance 

 not to be seen, but nigh at hand about the thickness and 

 length of an ordinary tobacco-pipe. I wonder what their 

 food may be so far from land, for I cannot learn that they 

 have been observed to prey upon any fish or birds, unless 

 they resort to some small island yet undiscovered. I 

 heard, since I came hither, that they frequent the rocks 

 on the windward, or eastern part, of this island ; which, 

 if true, I will endeavour to procure some," &c. 



York, December 13, 1674. 



Mr. RAY to Dr. LISTER. 



DEAR SIR, I thank you for the information sent about 

 the birds. I have read of the one in some books of 

 voyages, viz. the Booby, but know nothing else of it but 

 the name. I wish I had a particular description of it, that 

 so I might insert it in our Ornithology. The Doctor, 

 your friend, seems to promise you the bird dried, which, 

 when you receive, I shall beg a description of it from 

 you. 



The Tropic-bird dried I have seen in the Repository of 

 the Royal Society, and have described as well as I can, 

 I find it to belong to that sort of birds which I call Palmi- 

 ped, with all the four toes webbed together, such as are 

 the Cormorants [Phalacrocorax carbo] and Soland-goose 

 \j3ula alba\ ; and therefore, without doubt, preys upon 

 fishes and lives only upon them. That which I observed 

 most remarkable in it was, that the tail consisted only of 

 two very long feathers ; at least, I was informed that it 

 had only two feathers in the tail, and there were but two 

 left remaining in the case, which accords well with what 

 Dr. Towne writes ; yet I am suspicious, that besides those 

 two long feathers, there are other shorter in the tail. 



Having finished the History of Birds, I am now 



