5Qb CRUISE OF STEAMER CORWIN IN THE ARCTIC OCEAN. 



Rogers sind tbe Corwiu has defined it. Further work will undoubtedly add other .species to the 

 li.st and widen the range of others. 



Hut it is thought the present paper will give a very good idea of the bird life of the regions 

 visited. Having the continent of America on the one side and Asia on the other, it might be 

 anticijtated that we should secure specially rich results from the combinations of two faunas; yet, 

 although this is true to a certain extent, there are predominating reasons to prevent the very marked 

 exhibition of this. The first is the location of the region within the limits inhabited by a circum- 

 j)olar fauna, and in consequence frequented by many sjiecies of wide distribution. The next is the 

 similarity of the two barren coast lines and outlying islands, oftering but small inducements to land 

 birds, while the sea birds, as usual, are species common to extended areas. 



The usually low but rolling coast country, a monotonous grass-grown plain, varied by lichen or 

 moss-covered slopes, or wind-swept hills reaching back farinto the interior, are the onlj' variations 

 to the general level. Here and there a few weathered pieces of driftwood break the cold gray of the 

 shingly beach, while clusters of native huts or tents lend a passing interest to the cheerless coast, 

 thus oflering but slight inducements for birds. 



As might well be expected, the former region north of Bering Straits is entirely Arctic ; and 

 south of Uering Straits in Bering Sea the water birds may be divided into two groups — those fre- 

 quenting the deep water surrounding the Aleutian, Fur Seal, and Bering Strait Islands, and the 

 adjoining Siberian coast for the first group; and the shallow-water species occurring along the Alas- 

 kan shore from the mouth of the Kuskoquin River to the vicinity of Bering Straits. The former 

 group includes the auks and allied species; also the Rogers Fulmar and Steller's eider; and the 

 second group such species as the emperor goose, the spectacled eider, and many of the fresh and 

 brackish water ducks. 



This distinction of the two shores holds also, to a certain extent, north of Bering Straits, 

 these two shores having there somewhat the same relationship I have just mentioned. There is 

 also a difl'erence still more striking to be noted between the species frequenting the sea north of 

 Bering Straits and those to the south. North of the straits the auks are very rare, while south 

 throughout the Aleutian Islands, over all the other islands of Bering Sea, except along its eastern 

 border, including even the islands in Bering Straits, they swarm in the greatest abundance ; while 

 the presence in Bering Sea of several other species, including gulls and petrels not found north 

 of the straits, makes the ditference still more striking. Beyond these differences, however, it is 

 difficult to divide the region into any w-ell-niarked faunal districts. 



Though along some parts of the coast the breeding water fowl fill the marshes with life, yet 

 the rocky islands of Bering Sea are the places about which birds exist in the greatest numbers ; 

 and as Baron Nordenskiold well remarks in his account of the Vega's voyage, "It is not the larger 

 inhabitants of the Polar regions, such as the whale, walrus, bear, and seal, which first attract the ex- 

 plorer's attention, but the innumerable flocks of birds that swarm around the polar traveller during 

 the long summer day of the North. And this is especially striking about any of the islands which 

 birds — the gulls, guillemots, and auks — seek as breeding-places. The islands of Bering Straits 

 resemble enormous beehives, about which the birds swarm in countless numbers, filling the air with 

 their swiftly moving forms in every direction, and the waters are covered with them all about the 

 islands, while every jutting point and place where foothold can be obtained is taken possession 

 of by them for breeding-places. 



Although Herald Island is almost perpetually surrounded by the ice-pack, yet we found it 

 swarming with murres, guillemots, and gulls ; as were also some of the cliffs on Wraugel Island. 

 Still to the westward, on some of the islands visited by the Jeannett« crew on their retreat towards 

 the Siberian coast, this was also found to be the case, as Mr. Newcomb informs me and they found 

 there guillemots in extreme abundance, although the islands were surrounded by an almost un- 

 broken ice-pack. 



For the benefit of naturalists visiting this region in future, I will mention a few localities where 

 certain species of considerable interest may be obtained. The Emperor Goose is quite abundant 

 on the southwestern portion of Saint Lawrence Island, frequenting the low, flat portion of the island 

 intersected by lagoons. The islands of Bering Strait are all of them resorted to by the Crested 

 Parrot-billed and Least Auks, and the Diomede Islands in particular are frequented by myriads 



