SANDWICH TERN. 499 



number, for the reception of which a shallow hole is 

 scratched among the sea-campion, or other plants that 

 may happen to grow on the selected place. The eggs 

 are two inches in length, by one inch five lines in breadth ; 

 of a yellowish stone colour; thickly spotted with ash- 

 grey, orange-brown, and deep red-brown, but subject to 

 considerable variation in the markings. As soon as the 

 young birds become tolerably fledged, but before they are 

 altogether able to fly, they frequently take to the water, 

 swimming off to the smaller rocks, where they continue to 

 be fed by the parents until capable of joining them in their 

 fishing excursions. The time of the arrival of the old 

 birds is about the middle of May ; incubation commences 

 in the first week in June, and nearly the whole have again 

 taken their departure for more southern latitudes by the 

 end of September/' Mr. Macgillivray, in his Manual, 

 mentions having obtained this species in the Frith of Forth, 

 and it was seen by the natural history party in Suther- 

 landshire, upon the Friths of Tongue and Eribol. 



M. Nilsson says it is seen in the southern parts of 

 Sweden occasionally; it is included among the birds of 

 Germany, and M. Temminck says it is abundant in North 

 Holland. It is found on the coast of France, and is said to 

 breed on some islands off Ushant; it visits some of the 

 lakes of Switzerland, is seen at Genoa, and goes eastward 

 to Italy. It is found in various parts of Africa, and speci- 

 mens were in the collection brought by Dr. Andrew Smith 

 from the Cape of Good Hope. 



Mr. Audubon, in his Birds of America, says the Sand- 

 wich Tern is seen from Texas, during spring and summer, 

 to the Floridas, where it breeds in great numbers ; but is 

 never observed in any other part of the coast of America. 

 Considered to be migratory. 



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