Birds of Celebes: Laridae. 905 



Nest. The eggs are laid upon a little collection of small lumps of coral and stone on the 

 bare rock, or in a httle depression in the sand (Andaman and Nicobar Is., Hume 22). 



Distribution. Indian and Pacific Oceans — fi-om Tenasserim and the Andamans to the 

 island-groups north of Madagascar; from the Loochoo Islands and E. and S. China 

 through the East India Archipelago to New Guinea, New Caledonia and N. and 

 E. Australia, west as far as the Marshall, Phoenix, and Samoa Islands in Polynesia. 

 — In Celebes: Celebes (Reinwardt 5); Banka Island (Nat. Coll.); Lembeh Island 

 (P. & F. Sarasin). 



The type of the Black-filletted Tern was obtained, apparently in 1821, by 

 Reinwardt in Celebes, but not many examples have been collected there since. 

 It breeds, however, at Lembeh Island, as is proved by the young example 

 killed there by the cousins Sarasin; it looks as if it had not been more than 

 a fortnight out of the nest. Other known breeding places are the Andamans 

 and Nicobars, S. and E. China, the Pelew Islands, sandbanks off N. Australia, 

 and various islands of Polynesia (eggs in the Nehrkorn Coll.). It is, however, to 

 some extent also a migrant, for instance Abbe David (9) and Mr. De La Touche 

 (26) observe that it comes to the rocky islets off the coast of China in 

 great numbers in the warm season to breed; and similarly, as Hume and 

 Davison (b 1) found, it visits the Andamans towards the end of April for this 

 purpose. 



This is a beautiful and very distinct species, easily recognised by its having 

 the whole head above white encircled by a band of black passing through the 

 eye and round the nape, by its light pearl-grey upper plumage with the outer 

 web of the outer primary black, and black bill and feet. From the angular 

 cut of its shorter remiges, which bear resemblance to those of the next species 

 ^. anaestheta, it is evidently an admirable flier. Its most special characteristic 

 is the restriction of the black of the head to a broad fillet. In the Sterninae 

 black is a very persistent colour over the forehead, crown and nape; in a large 

 number of typical Terns the whole upper head, down to the level of the under 

 eyelid and nape is black; white appears first (or black disappears first, as the 

 case may be) on the forehead and supraloral region, as shown in many species, 

 for instance S. minuta, S. bergii, S. fuliginosa ; in -S. melanauchen the black is re- 

 stricted to a band round the head, in -S. trudeaui of S. America the band no 

 longer passes round the nape, but it remains as a stiipe through the eye; in 

 Gygis there is no black at all in the plumage. In a species of Anous, Anous 

 leucocapillus, the entire state of things is reversed; the head above and nape are 

 white and the rest of the bird black. In the true Terns it may be noted that 

 the black on the head expands, so to say, in the breeding season and recedes 

 in the winter; the young of many species of Terns also show a tendency to 

 acquire black on the nape and on the region of the eye, but less so on the 

 crown and not at all on the forehead. As a parallel case may be cited a 

 group of Orioles: Oriolus melanisticus oi T?\?L\xt, O. broderipi, celebensis, galbula, a.ud 

 others, in which the black on the head and nape forms (sometimes) an almost 



.Meyer & Wigl esworth, Birds of Celebes {Dec. 14th, 1S07). H* 



^^i^naa I I I II 1 



