GULL- BILLED TERN. 517 



The specimens I have been able to examine, some from 

 Germany and others in the British Museum, appear to me 

 to be of the same species, the tarsus in all of them mea- 

 suring one inch and a quarter, the middle toe and claw 

 together being of the same length as the tarsus. M. Tem- 

 minck mentioned that Boie had received specimens from 

 the eastern coast of Jutland, where this bird is said to 

 breed. Two examples were seen in the south of Holland, 

 in the summer of 1839, by M. Temminck himself, one of 

 which was obtained. M. Savi includes this species in his 

 Birds of Italy. It visits the shores of the Red Sea ; and 

 M. Temminck says it is very abundant in the islands of 

 Sunda, several specimens sent him from thence not dif- 

 fering from those of Europe. The Sterna affinis of Dr. 

 Horsfield, obtained in Java, is considered also by M. Tem- 

 minck to be of the same species. 



This Tern feeds on small fishes and large insects ; fre- 

 quenting marshes rather than the sea coast, and lays two 

 or three eggs, one in my own collection measures one inch 

 eleven lines in length, by one inch four lines in breadth, 

 of a dull greyish white, with a few spots of ash-grey, and 

 a greater number of dark reddish brown. 



In the adult in summer the bill is black, and one inch 

 and a quarter in length from the point to the feathers on 

 the forehead : the angle at the symphisis of the lower 

 mandible rather prominent ; irides reddish-brown ; fore- 

 head, crown, and nape jet black ; neck behind greyish- 

 white ; back, scapulars, wings, the coverts, secondaries, 

 and tertials, upper tail-coverts and tail-feathers uniform 

 pale ash-grey ; the outside web of the first primary slate- 

 grey, the other primaries pearl-grey ; chin, throat, breast, 

 belly, and all the under surface white ; legs, toes, mem- 

 branes, and claws black. The whole length of the bird 



