MEDITERRANEAN BLAGK-EEADEB GULL. 81 



to the same authority, great diameter forty-four to forty-five mille- 

 metres, small diameter thirty-five to thirty-five and a half. 



The following is an account from the "Field," published there by 

 me of this bird from Mr. W. H. Cullen, of Kustendji: — 



Black-headed Mediterranean Gull, or Adriatic Gull. (Bree, 

 vol. iv., plate; Larus melanocepTialus , Natterer.) — On another small 

 sand bank, but at some distance off, in the same lake, was a small 

 colony of this Gull, in nests exactly like those of the Slender-bill, 

 and, though distinct, yet entirely surrounded by the nests of several 

 other species of Gulls and Terns. The traps enabled us to secure four 

 and some eggs. These birds are much more difiicult of access than the 

 Slender-bill, and, like it, entirely deserted their nests the night after 

 the capture. Many were seen flying about; but their locality could 

 not be discovered. These also live on the same species of beetle. — ■ 

 Wm. Hy. Cullen (Kustendji, July, 1870). 



This bird is readily distinguished from the so-called Black-headed 

 Gull of the British Isles by the uniform jet black colour, instead of 

 brown, of the head and nape, and the larger and stouter coral- 

 coloured beak. The tarsi are shorter in the common British species 

 or race. In other respects they are very closely allied, and I think 

 their claims to be named the races of each other may be very fairly 

 granted. They form, however, an interesting link in the great 

 series of Black-heads, from the Little Gull, L. minutus up to the 

 Great Black-headed Gull, L. ichthya'etos. Fourteen eggs, all that were 

 taken, have been sent to me. They differ, like our Black-head, 

 very much in size and colour; but I have compared them with one 

 hundred specimens of the latter in my collection, and they differ 

 markedly from that motley crew. They are deficient in one great 

 character of the British ^g^, viz., the prevailing shade of green, 

 which as a rule pervades the latter, but which is entirely absent 

 in the fourteen eggs sent to me. In size they vary from one inch 

 and nine tenths long by one inch and two tenths broad, the smallest, 

 . to two inches and a half by one inch and a half the largest. 

 The ground colour varies from a dirty white in seven specimens 

 to light yellowish brown in four, and a darker tint of the same 

 colour in three. 



One specimen has a few scattered spots of umber brown, and 

 another a few spots and streaks of the same colour. Two have more 

 and larger, and two more and smaller and distincter spots, of two 

 shades of the same colour. In three the colourings are of a richer 

 brown, and are more thickly spotted and streaked at the larger end; 



VOL. V. M 



