320 LARIDyE. 



In winter the forehead is spotted with white, and the lower 

 parts are nearly white. Young birds have the upper parts white 

 with dark brown interinarginal bands on the feathers, and all the 

 primaries dark grey, the first almost black, with conspicuous white 

 inner borders. 



Bill black, red at base ; irides dark brown ; legs and feet scarlet. 



Length 15 ; tail 5*5 to 7'5, depth of fork 4 to 5 ; wiog 9 ; 

 tarsus '75 ; bill from gape 2. 



Distribution. Coasts of the temperate and tropical Atlantic and of 

 the Indian Ocean. This Tern has not hitherto been recorded with 

 certainty on the west coast of India? though it is said to have been 

 seen in Sind, but it is far from rare in Ceylon and at the Andamans, 

 and\vas obtained by Davison on the coast of Southern Tenasseriin. 



Habits, $c. A sea-tern, usually seen near the coasts. Mr. Parker 

 found a colony breeding on a sandbank near Adam's Bridge, North- 

 west Ceylon, in June. Each clutch contained one or two eggs, 

 laid in a small hollow in the sand very little above high-water 

 mark ; the eggs were brownish or greenish grey, spotted and 

 blotched as usual, and measured about 1-58 by 1-12. 



1509. Sterna sinensis. TJie White-shafted Ternlet. 



Sterna sinensi?, Gm. Si/st. Nat. i, p. f>03 (1788); Hume, S. F. v, 

 p. 325; ill. Cat. no. 988 bis: Ley ye, Birds Ceyl. p. 1019; Parker, 

 S. F. ix, p. 490 ; Oates, B. B. ii, p. 430 ; Gates in Hume's N. 8f E. 

 '2nd ed. iii, p. 312, parti m ; Suimders, Cat. B. M. xxv, p. 113. 

 ternula sinensis, Holdsivorth, P. Z. S. 1872 ; p. 481 ; Leyge, S. F. 

 iii, p. 377 ; iv, p. 246. 



Sternula nrinuta, apud Oates, S. F. iii, p. 349 ; Wardl.-Rams. Ibis. 

 1877, p. 472. 



Coloration. A broad arrowhead-shaped white patcli on the 

 forehead, the posterior angles running back above the eyes ; crown, 

 nape, and broad loral band from crown to base of culmen black, 

 including the orbit, and extending above but not beneath it, and 

 separated beneath by a narrow white stripe from the upper man- 

 dible; back, rump, and wings pale pearl-grey; shafts of all 

 primaries white ; outer web of outer primary and inner web near 

 the shaft dark grey or blackish, both primaries and secondaries 

 with much of the inner web white, and the outer web of the second- 

 aries near the end also bordered with white ; upper tail-coverts and 

 tail, wdth the whole of the lower parts and the cheeks, white. 



In winter the white forehead is broader and the tail shorter. 

 Young birds have the crown greyish, lores mostly white, primaries 

 dark grey, the shaft of 1st primary white, of others brownish, 

 tail-feathers greyish. In very young birds the back-feathers, 

 scapulars, and tertiaries are brown, with huffy- white borders and 

 csntres, the crown mixed white and black, the nape blackish with 

 white edges. 



Bill in summer yellow, broadly tipped with black; in winter 

 dark brown ; iridos brown ; legs and feet orange-yellow in summer, 

 reddish brown in winter (Oates}. 



