AVES— NODDY... GULL. 



655 



Among the foreign birds of the tern genus, there are some found of a 

 snowy white ; but the most singular bird of this kind is the striated tern, 



which is found at NeAv Zealand. It is thirteen inches in length. The bill 

 is black, and the body in general mottled, or rather striped with black and 

 white. 



THE NODDYi 



Is about fifteen inches long. The bill is black, and two inches long, and the 

 whole plumage a sooty brown, except the top of the head, which is white. 

 It is a very common bird in the tropical seas, where it is known frequently 

 to fly on board ships, and is taken with the hand. But though it be thus 

 stupid, it bites the fingers severely, so as to make it unsafe to hold it. It is 

 said to breed in the Bahama Islands. 



THE GULL, 2 



And all its varieties, is well known to most readers. It is seen with slow 

 sailing flight hovering over rivers, to prey upon the smaller kinds of fish ; 

 it is seen following the ploughman in fallow fields to pick up insects; and 



' Sterna stolida, Lath. 



* The genus Larus, which comprises most of the eulls has the bill 1011?, or middle- 

 sized, strong, hard, compressed, eaged, bent toward the tip ; lower mandible angulated 

 near the point; nostrils lateral, in the middle of the bill, longitudinally cleft, straiglit, and 

 pervious; legs slender, naked above the knee; tarsus long; three fore toes quite webbed, 

 the hinder free, short, placed high on the tarsus; tail feathers of equal length ; wings long. 



