The Zoologist — Maech, 1873. 3445 



January, 1873, 



Glaucous Gull, dc. — Jan. 1. A hundred gulls, great black- 

 backed and herring, with rooks or crows among them, on the West 

 Mud ; the contrast of the black and white plumages looked very- 

 pretty. Examined an adult glaucous gull which had been killed 

 in the Sound : its stomach contained a large lump of fat, which 

 had no doubt been thrown overboard from some ship ; there were 

 also a ievf feathers in it. Although the young of both the Iceland 

 and glaucous gulls, of which I have myself killed a k\\, are occa- 

 sionally met with on our coasts during the autumn and winter, 

 yet this is the first adult glaucous gull I ever saw in the flesh. 



Jan. 2. Went to Falmouth, where I saw Dr. Bullmore's 

 collection of British birds, in which were Bartram's sandpiper and 

 Bonaparte's gull, local specimens, besides other good things. Dr. 

 BuUmore had recently obtained a specimen of the blacktailed 

 godwit, very uncommon in Devon and Cornwall. 



Jan. 3. Saw another glaucous gull flying up the harbour, also 

 some northern divers off" the Devil's Point, Stonehouse. Great 

 blackbacked gulls very plentiful; lots brought to the birdstuffer's, 

 I am sorry to say. 



Puffin. — Jan. 4. Examined a very fine puflin, which had been 

 killed the day before. Its bill was not small, as is generally the 

 case with young birds found in winter, but, on the contrary, rather 

 large, well coloured, and furrowed, though without the conspicuous 

 ridge at the base of the upper mandible, and wanting the puckered 

 skin round the mouth and warty excrescence under the eyelid. 

 The specimen, however, was about the largest I ever saw. 



Jan. 7. Again saw the old glaucous gull in the harbour. This 

 species, I remarked, seems to be in the habit of often settling on 

 the water for a short time. 



Jan. 8. Examined a fine old northern diver, which had much of 

 the summer plumage remaining, the wings being almost as beauti- 

 fully spotted as in the breeding-season ; many spots also on the 

 back, and strong traces of the dark bands on the neck. In its 

 gullet was a very large specimen of the greater pipe fish, above 

 sixteen inches in length. The same day saw the old glaucous gull 

 again, and shot an immature one. 



Phalarope. — Jan. 8. Observed a gray phalarope swimming 

 among some drift-weed just outside the surf, in the lee of a 



SECOND SERIES — VOL. VIII. P 



