384 LARIDiE. 



I have occasionally (particularly in April and May) seen old as 

 well as young birds ascend the river Lagan as far as the tide 

 flows, but chiefly at low water : — a beautiful adult bird shot 

 there on the 8th of April, 1837, at the docks of the canal, 

 came under my inspection. An immature one, killed on Lough 

 Neagh, has been brought to me. Mr. E, Ball mentions his having, 

 in the spring of 1831 or 1833, fired at an adult bird, seated on 

 a rock off Ireland's Eye. It fell into the water, where, after a 

 considerable battle, in which his hands were repeatedly wounded, 

 he captured it. On examination, it did not appear that his shot 

 had taken effect, but there seemed to be an injury some days old, 

 on one of its wings, which had probably been grazed by a bullet. 

 The bird being tied up in a handkerchief, often contrived to get its 

 head out, and seldom without mauaging to draw blood from some- 

 body near. It was, however, safely brought to Dublin. On being 

 enlarged in a room, and offered some cold meat, this was eagerly 

 partaken of, and on the moment the bird became perfectly tame. 

 It was placed in the Zoological Gardens, Phoenix Park, where it 

 was for a long time an especial favourite, on account of its tame- 

 ness and beauty. It recovered the power of flight, and used 

 sometimes to go away for a few days, and return again. On one 

 occasion it was observed to mount very high in the air, and fly 

 sea-ward, after which it was never again seen. This gull was in 

 the garden about two years. 



The two species of black-backed gulls were remarked by the 

 late Mr. G. Matthews and his party, to be about equally common 

 along the coast of Norway in summer and autumn. 



Audubon (vol. iii. p. 305) gives a very full description of this 

 species, as observed by him generally, at breeding-stations, on 

 ship-deck, &c. ; and at p. 312 there appears in his work a most 

 interesting liistory from the pen of Dr. Neill, of Edinburgh, of 

 one of these birds kept in this gentleman's garden, and which, 

 having the use of its wings, went off annually in the spring, as 

 was supposed, to some breeding-haunt, but regularly returned for 

 a long period of years to spend his winter in the vicinity of the 

 learned metropolis, with the kind friend under whose care he was 



