176 THE GULLS 



and Schaudinn and Koenig record clutches of four eggs. Although 

 in some cases indistinguishable from those of the great blackbacked- 

 gull, they are frequently a much blunter and more rounded oval in 

 shape. Like most gulls' eggs, they are found in varying shades of olive- 

 brown or bluish green, and are rather sparingly blotched, streaked, and 

 spotted with dark maroon or blackish brown and violet-grey shell- 

 marks. On Koenig's expedition a light bluish green clutch, only 

 slightly marked with a few shell-marks and greyish brown blotches, was 

 found on Bear Island. Formerly it was believed that the red eggs of 

 the herring-gull (and perhaps also of the great blackbacked-gull), 

 which have occasionally been taken on the islands off Yardo in 

 Norway, belonged to this species, but it is now generally agreed that 

 it does not breed in Norway at all. 



Of the habits of this gull during incubation and while rearing the 

 young we know practically nothing. Yet it has bred more than once 

 in the Zoological Gardens at London, and two young birds which were 

 hatched there on June 24, 1868, were still alive and well in 1879. 

 There is, however, no notice of this interesting event in the Proceedings 

 of the Zoological Society for 1868, and Larus glaucus is not even 

 mentioned in a list of birds which have bred in the Gardens, which 

 appeared in the Proceedings for 1869. These birds, however, enabled 

 Howard Saunders to watch their changes of plumage to maturity, and 

 to satisfy himself that the almost uniform creamy or even perfectly 

 white plumage is assumed for a very short time just before the 

 autumnal moult at which the pearl-grey mantle is assumed. It was a 

 bird in this stage which was described as a new species by Richardson, 

 under the name of Larus hutchinsi. 



Mr. F. J. Jackson tells us that on his approaching a nest, one of 

 the birds scattered some of the nest material over the eggs, no doubt 

 with intent to conceal them. They showed considerable courage in 

 defending the nest, swooping down within a foot or two of his head, 

 and uttering loud screeches as they passed. 1 Fischer says that both 



1 F. J. Jackson, A Thousand Days in the Arctic, p. 391. 



