S20 ANOUS XEMA 



buffy white in ground-colour, sparingly marked with pale pur- 

 plish grey shell spots and reddish brown or dark brown surface 

 spots, and measure about 2'06 by 1'38. 



XEMA, Leach, 1819. 



1128. SABINE'S GULL. 



XEMA SABINII. 



Xema sabinii (J. Sabine), Trans. Linn. Soc. xii. p. 520, pi. 29 (1818) ; 

 (Middendorff), Sib. Reise, p. 244, Tab. xxiv. fig. 5, pull. ; Tab. xxv. 

 fig. 1, egg (1853) ; (Naum.), xiii. p. 272, Taf. 272, figs. 3, 4 ; (Gould), 

 B. of E. v. pi. 429 ; id. B. of Gt. Brit. v. pi. 67 ; Newton, P.Z.S. 

 1871, p. 57, pi. iv. fig. 5 (egg) ; Dresser, viii. p. 337, pi. 593 ; 

 Saunders, Cat. B. Br. Mas. xxv. p. 162 ; id. Manual, p. 657 ; 

 Ridgway, p. 38 ; Lilford, vi. p. 32, pi. 14 ; Tacz. F. 0. Sib. 0. 

 p. 1046. 



< ad. (Arctic America). Head and upper neck rich dark plumbeous 

 bordered below with, black ; mantle pale blue-grey ; edge of the wing 

 and first five quills. black, the latter margined on the inner web, and tipped 

 with white ; secondaries and their coverts blue-grey tipped with white ; 

 rest of plumage and the tail white ; the latter slightly forked ; bill 

 blackish, tipped with orange on the upper, and yellow on the lower 

 mandible ; edge of eyelids and gape vermilion ; legs blackish ; iris light 

 brown. Culmen 1'3, wing ll'O, tail 4'6, tarsus 1'4 inch. Sexes alike. 

 In winter the head and neck are white, the ear-coverts and back of head 

 and neck dusky plumbeous. The young have the mantle brownish grey 

 marked with pale brown and dirty white, the crown brownish ashy, and 

 the tail crossed by a subterminal black band. 



Hob. The most northern parts Arctic regions of the Old and 

 New Worlds, visiting the British Isles, where it has been 

 obtained on many occasions, the coasts of the North Sea to 

 Norway, Denmark, Holland, N. Germany, and France, and has 

 been recorded from as far south as Switzerland, Austria, and 

 Hungary ; in America it has been obtained on the Atlantic side 

 as far south as the Bermudas and Texas, and on the Pacific it 

 visits the coasts of Peru to Callao Bay in numbers. So far as is 

 known, it breeds only from the Taimyr to the Yukon, not in 

 Spitsbergen or Greenland. 



In general habits and especially in its flight this Gull is very 

 Tern-like, and in the breeding season associates with the Arctic 

 Tern. It feeds chiefly on insects of various kinds in the breed- 

 ing season, and small fish and crustaceans in the winter. It 

 breeds in the high north, its nest being a depression in the 

 moss, and its 2 eggs, which are laid late in June or early in 



