( 264 ) LARIDM. 



THE BLACK TERN. 



STERN, SCARE CROW, BLUE DARR, CAR SWALLOW, 

 CLOVER-FOOTED GULL. 



Hydrochelidon nigra. 



We hold our course o'er the deep, or the land, 

 O'er the swelling tide or weed-grown strand. 



ELIZA COOK, Song of the Seagulls. 



THE only precise record of the occurrence of this bird in the 

 county is by the late Dr. George Johnston, who, in his 

 MS. Notes, kindly placed at my disposal by his daughter 

 Mrs. Barwell Carter of The Anchorage, Berwick-on-Tweed, 

 states that a Black Tern was taken at Springhill, near Cold- 

 stream, on the 9th of May 1851, the information regarding 

 its capture having been communicated to him by Miss Anne 

 Hunter. 



This species formerly bred in great numbers in the 

 eastern counties of England, but is now only a visitor to the 

 British Islands on spring and autumn migrations. 1 



Mr. Eobert Gray says that it is rare on the Dunbar 

 coast, only one or two examples having been shot there. 2 



1 Yarrell's British Birds, vol. iii. p. 517. 



2 Hist. Ber. Nat. Club, vol. viii. p. 55. 



