THE PORK-TAILED PETREL. 415 



less night-feeding birds. Temminck does not give any indication 

 of his being aware of these birds appearing here in the manner 

 described. 



THE FORK-TAILED PETEEL. 



Tkalassidroma Leachii, Teinm.^ (sp.) 

 Procellaria „ „ 



Is of occasional occurrence in all quarters of the island. 



Tpiose obtained in the north shall first be noticed. In the winter 

 of 1831 a specimen was found dead — but in excellent condition 

 and plumage — near Lisburn. During a storm in the winter of 

 1833-4, one was sprung from a bog near Downpatrick, and 

 shot ; the fowler imagining from the forked tail that it was some 

 kind of swallow. In August 1843, the gamekeeper at Tollymore 

 Park informed me that about ten years before that time, he found 

 one of these birds lying dead in " a hollow " among the moun- 

 tains of Mourne. One shot on the 16th of December, 1834, at 

 Conswater Point, Belfast Bay, about a mile from the town, came 

 into my possession, and on the J 0th of April, 1838, I obtained a 

 recent bird, which was found dead near Waringstown, county of 

 Down. There is considerable difference in the size of these two 

 specimens, as well as slight differences in plumage : the former is 

 8;i- inches in length ; the latter 7^, the size of the individual de- 

 scribed in YarrelFs work. Mr. H. H. Dombrain, one day in 

 September 1836, when in a revenue cruiser off Arraninore, coast 

 of Donegal,' saw altogether about a dozen of these birds, two of 

 which occasionally appeared at a time. 



On the 16th of December, 1831, two fork-tailed petrels were 



* Dr. Fleming, when giving the name of Bullockii to this species, in his ' His- 

 tory of British Animals,' p. 136, states, that Dr. Leach having intimated to him 

 that Temminck proposed to name the species Lcachii, he " remonstrated, bnt in 

 vain, against his acceptance of a complimeut to which he had no claim;" JMr. 

 Selby, in the same sjiirit, adopted the name bestowed on the species by Fleming. 

 If tlic bird were to be "called after" any individual, Jinllock being its discoverer 

 certaiidy had the best right to be so honoured, but, according to the stern law of pii- 

 ority. Die term Luach'u must be adopted. 



