280 LARlDyE. 



to the island and shot four roseate, four common, and two arctic 

 terns. He obtained the eggs of each species, twenty-three alto- 

 gether, the whole of which were evidently laid on that or the 

 preceding morning; those of the roseate being placed in small 

 cavities beneath blocks of stone. No young were seen. A 

 broken egg of the Sandwich tern, and three birds of that species, 

 were observed. There were considered to be at least seventy or 

 eighty roseate terns there, and twice that number of common and 

 arctic combined, as they could not be distinguished on wing. 



In June 1850, the roseate tern was shot at Lambay Island, and 

 it has been procured in the bays of Drogheda and Dublin ; such 

 birds being probably wanderers from the Eockabill. 



On questioning Mr. Glennon, in May 1837, respecting this 

 species, he stated that in the month of June, a few years pre- 

 viously, he had received in a fresh state, from the coast of Wex- 

 ford, about fifty specimens. Capt. Walker, of Belmont, near the 

 town of Wexford, in a letter to me dated November 19th, 1836, 

 remarked — " In the spring, different sorts of terns are com- 

 mon on the sand-banks here, and the nest of the roseate is inge- 

 nious : the sand is slightly hollowed, and, to prevent the eggs 

 rolling away, it is surrounded by a small hoop about three inches 

 in diameter, made of hent (a strong grass wliich grows on the 

 sand hills), and put very neatly together." 



At Roundstone, on the coast of Galway, the Rev. G. Robinson 

 saw a tern in July 1844, which, from its call, mode of flight, 

 general appearance, and difference from those of the common 

 and arctic species, he thought must be the roseate, which was 

 familiar to him from a recent visit to the Rockabill. 



Such is all the information that can at present be given of this 

 elegant species ; but scanty as it is, that supplied to us respecting 

 the roseate tern on the coasts of England and Scotland is not 

 more full. The only breeding-haunts on the English coast that 

 I find positively recorded, are the Earn and Coquet"^ Islands, off 

 Northumberland, and Eoulney Island,t off Lancashire ; and on 



* Hewitsou's ' Eggs of Brit. Birds.' 



t Ibid. On authority of Mr. Jolia Hancock, of Newcastle on Tyne. 



