A Monograph of Marcus Island. 99 



I never saw one alight in a tree ; the}'- are alwa^-s found roosting 

 on the ground, where they nest. From the Japanese I understood 

 that a few birds remain on the island throughout the year. 



Their food is made up entirely of the small surface-swimming 

 fish ; for these the}' can go as far as three or four hundred miles 

 out to sea and return the same night to roost. On several occasions 

 as we were nearing the island we would see small parties of terns 

 on their homeward journey. Not infrequently a pair of old birds 

 would be accompanied by their brown-bodied young. The inex- 

 perienced birds sighting our ship and regarding it as a suitable 

 place to alight and rest would fly straight for the vessel, whereupon 

 the parents would set up a cry of K-r-a-a, k-r-a-a, whereat the 

 3'oung birds, obedient to the warning, would change the course and 

 submissively follow^ the parent birds on out of sight in the distance. 



In August many of the old birds were moulting. During this, 

 period they seem to behave not unlike our cage canaries — sit about 

 dejecTied, and appear to take little interest in things, indeed hardly 

 moving out of the wa}' as one walked through the brood. With 

 this species the feathers seem to come off more or less iu patches,, 

 usually first about the head. From the series secured I have. 

 sele(5led and measured two adults and two immature birds which 

 will show the comparative size of the young when able to shift for 

 themselves. 



Hkm.vhks. — Bill and feet of immatnre birds reddish lirowu. 



Judging from the stage of advancement attained by the brood in 

 August the eggs must have been deposited in May or earh' in June. 



It is worthy of record that on examining the thousands of tern 

 skins which the Japanese had prepared I could not find one of the 

 Gray-backed Tern {Sterna lunata). None of the Japanese had 

 ever seen a tern with a blue-gra\' back ; .so the island may be re- 

 garded as out of the range of this species. 



Anous stolidus (Linn.). Noddy. 



The Nodd)', ranging as it does, pracftically all over the Pacific 

 Ocean from Laysan down to Australia and the Chatham Ids., was 

 one of the birds I had expecfted to find on Marcus ; nor was I dis- 



