380 BRITISH BIRDS. 



ALGA ALLE. 



LITTLE AUK, 



(PLATE 45.) 



Uria minor, Briss. Orn. vi. p. 73 (1760). 



Alca alle, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 211 (1760); et auctorum plurimorum Gmelin, 



Latliam, (Naumanri), (Dresser), (Sounders), &c. 



Alle nigricans, Link, Beschr. Nat.-Samml. Univ. Rostock, i. p. 17 (1806). 

 Mergulus alle (Linn.), Vieill. Analyse, p. 67 (1816). 



Mergulus melanoleucos, Leach, Syst. Cat. Mamm. c. Brit. M^us. p. 42 (1816). 

 Uria alle (Linn.), Pall. Zoogr. Rosso-Asiat. ii. p. 369 (1826). 

 Cephus alle (Linn.), Less. Traite d'Orn. p. 639 (1831). 

 Mergulus arcticus, Brehm, Vog. Deutschl. p. 994 (1831). 

 Arctica alle (Linn.), Gray, List Gen. B. p. 98 (1841). 



The Little Auk is only a winter visitor to the British Islands, and is 

 most common in the extreme northern portions, especially in the Orkneys 

 and Shetland. Further south it is only known as a somewhat rare 

 straggler, but has been met with at various places on the Scotch and 

 English coasts. It is also a winter visitor to Ireland, where its presence 

 has probably been to a great extent overlooked, especially in the north. 

 Numbers have been met with at great distances inland, blown from the 

 sea by storms ; but there is little doubt that many of the birds recorded 

 as Little Auks from these inland localities are only young Puffins. Oc- 

 casional examples have been obtained in the Channel Islands. 



The Little Auk is an Atlantic species, but it only breeds north of 

 the Arctic circle. It is most abundant on the coasts of Spitzbergeu, where 

 it is said to breed in countless thousands, and ranges eastwards as far as 

 Franz-Josef Land and Nova Zembla, and westwards to Grimsey Island, 

 north of Iceland, and to both shores of Greenland north of lat. 68. In all 

 these localities it is probably a partial resident ; but during winter many 

 wander southwards, and appear as gipsy migrants on the Atlantic coasts 

 of America as far south as the shores of New Jersey. It has once occurred 

 on the Azores, and is an irregular winter visitor to the Faroes, to the 

 British Islands, to the coasts of France and Spain, and to the Canary 

 Islands. It is more abundant at this season on the southern shores of 

 the German Ocean and on the coasts of Norway and North Russia. The 

 Little Auk has several allies in the North Pacific, none of them probably 

 very close, and all of them distinguished by the shape of the bill, in 

 which the chin-angle is nearer to the nostrils than to the tip. 



The Little Auk is almost exclusively an oceanic bird, and seldom ap- 

 proaches land except during the breeding-season. It sleeps on the water, 



