118 
CORDEAUX : BIRD-NOTES FROM THE HUMBER DISTRICT. 
gear amongst the fishing fleets from Grimsby and Hull had 
been the heaviest for many years. This gale drove many more 
Little Auks on shore. Once again on January 21st, N.E. 
strong ; hail and snow; sea high and rough; it was on this day 
‘that the main body of Little Auks were seen from Scarborough 
to the Spurn moving in continuous flocks to the south— 
thousands after thousands all in the same direction—some close 
in shore others again further out to sea. Off Flamborough the 
sea was covered with them. Along the line of flight many were 
shot, others flew inland, many were washed up dead, some 
living but exhausted. It is impossible to give any but an 
approximate estimate of the number which from one cause or 
another perished. From personal enquiries which I made at 
various localities along the coast, I should think that in the 
immediate neighbourhood of Scarborough and Filey the number 
would reach 400 to 500, and certainly not less than 1,000 for 
the Yorkshire coast and interior between Redcar and the 
Spurn, and it is not improbable it might even reach 1,500, for - 
dead birds might be found at high-water mark all along the coast- 
line. Storm-driven Auks were found in the most unexpected 
places, in village streets and country roads, back yards, ditches, 
gardens, and in a poultry enclosure with chickens. At 
Bridlington Quay one came down a chimney into a bedroom ; 
in the morning being conveyed to the beach it was set at liberty 
and flew to sea apparently none the worse for its adventure. 
In no case that I can ascertain was any sort of food found 
in the stomach of a captured bird. Those which I handled 
were all in poor condition, with the breast-bone sharp and 
prominent. They vary much in size, but size, Mr. Oxley 
Grabham, of Scarborough, told me, is no indication of sex, as 
one of the largest and one of the least of the Scarborough birds 
examined by him were both females. It is curious that a very 
large proportion of those obtained during this incursion were 
females. 
The colours of the soft parts vary in individuals. The bill is 
black, inside of mouth flesh-coloured with the palate studded 
with reversed horny papillae, tongue very large. In ornitho- 
logical works the iris is said to be a dark brown or hazel, and 
this is the normal colour. In one of our Lincolnshire birds 
which I examined it was dark slaty-blue. The tarsi and toes 
in front are a bluish or slaty white, and sometimes inclined to 
flesh colour, the same parts behind and beneath dusky (almost 
black in some), webs dark. One, in Mr. Grabham’s collection, 
~ Naturalist, 
