THE SKUAS. 515 



the common skua, belongs to the more northern parts of 

 Scandinavia. On the western coast of Finmark it would 

 not appear to be scarce; and M. Malm describes it as 

 common on the shores of the Icy Sea. It is also found, 

 Nilsson says, in the more northern parts of the Gulf of 

 Bothnia. It was very rare in our Skargard. Only two indi- 

 viduals, indeed, ever came under the notice of M. von 

 Wright; both were evidently out of their latitude, and so 

 exhausted as to be captured by the hand. It has in several 

 instances been killed in Denmark. 



It makes its nest in marshy ground, and lays two eggs, 

 olive-green in colour, and marked with brownish-grey and 

 dark-brown spots. 



The Richardson's Skua (Spets-stjertad Labbe, or Pointed- 

 tailed Labbe, Sw. ; L. Richardsonii, Swains.). This bird 

 was pretty common in our Skargard, where it was not unfre- 

 quently shot by us. It is also pretty common on both the 

 eastern and western coasts of Scandinavia, especially their 

 more northern parts, and as high up, I believe, as the North 

 Cape itself. M. Malm met with it everywhere on the shores 

 of the Icy Sea ; and says that after the young are fledged, 

 these birds, as also the pomarine skua, are at times to be 

 seen in the interior of the country. It is scarce in Denmark, 

 where, however, some few breed. 



The Richardson's skua, as with others of the tribe, is a 

 great persecutor of the gulls. It is not uninteresting to 

 watch the chase, and the anxiety of the gulls evinced by 

 their piercing cries and gyrations at the sight of the 

 enemy, whose coming they descry from a long distance. 



Pontoppidan, when speaking of this bird the Jo-Tyv, or 

 Jo-Thief, as he calls it says: "He is an enemy to other 



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