STERNA ASLESTHETA. 1041 



About four monilis old (October). Head much as in the adult in winter, but the lores darker, and the dark feathers 

 encroaching on the forehead and tipped with buff-white, and the nuchal feathers broadly tipped; just behind the 

 eye uniform black, passing under the eye ; hind neck grey ; mantle and rump broadly tipped with white, passing 

 into the brown with an oehraceous hue ; scapulars more deeply tipped still, and the ochraceous division more 

 noticeable ; wing-coverts less conspicuously tipped with white ; tail tipped as the scapulars, the outer feathers 

 entirely brown. Some examples have very little white on the forehead. Birds a month older than the above 

 show less of the ochreous -brown coloration, and the white tippmgs are to some extent worn off ; but no rule 

 can be established, as seldom two birds are alike, particularly about the head. 



Obs. The extent of the white over the eye varies : in some specimens it is produced quite beyond the posterior edge of 

 "the eyelid. There is also no little variation in the coloration of the hind neck, some specimens being much paler 

 than others, and occasionally quite white. A very fine female in breeding-plumage, from Paternoster Island, 

 measures :— length 15-5 inches ; tail 8-4, outer tail-feathers 5-0 longer than the central ; bill to gape 2-0 ; the 

 inner web joins the middle toe at the centre of the 2nd phalange, this being the most deeply excised foot I have 

 met with in any specimen examined. 



Sterna albigena, Licht., an interesting, slender-billed, grey-plumaged Tern, inhabiting the Red Sea and northern part of 

 the Indian Ocean, has recently been killed at the Laccadives, and therefore may occur in Ceylon at some future 

 time. Mr. Hume gives the dimensions of a male as : — length 14-5 inches, wing 9-9, tail 6-5, tarsus 0-77, middle 

 toe and claw 1-04, bill to gape 2-1 5. Li summer the bill is coral-red, blackish at the tips and base of culmen ; legs 

 and feet bright coral-red; iris brown; wings exceeding the tail by 3 lines (Heuglin). Above bluish grey; front 

 and sides of the neck, breast, and abdomen purplish grey ; chin and upper part of throat whitish ; lores and 

 beneath the eye snowy white. In winter the bill is reddish black, and the legs and feet Indian red. Back, 

 scapulars, and tail dark French grey, and the breast and abdomen dusky bluish grey ; lores and forehead white, 

 and the crown whitish, spotted with black (Hume). The red legs are a good distinguishing character. 



Distribution. — The Panayan Tern is exceedingly numerous on the coasts of Ceylon at certain seasons of 

 the year. It appears on the west coast;, when there is a strong wind blowing on shore, from May till October, 

 and again in April and May at the commencement of the south-west monsoon. At these periods it may be 

 seen in the Colombo Roads and in the inner harbour flying about in search of garbage, and alighting on the 

 little wooden buoys used by the native vessels. In August 1874 great numbers visited the port; and in 

 October 1876 it was more numerous still, the majority of the birds being quite young. In the former year I 

 saw great numbers at the Basses, and the following clay (in August) a good many in the Batticaloa Roads. 

 At Trincomalie I have chiefly noticed it in December and in April and May, at which dates it used to appear 

 for a few days and then move away. At Galle it was numerous in October and November in 1878, but was 

 not much seen in the daytime, making itself known by its incessant cries at night. Layard appears only to 

 have met with three specimens at Pt. Pedro while out at sea dredging ; and Mr. Holdsworth does not seem to 

 have seen it at all on tire Pearl Banks of Aripu. It must also be admitted that, though abundant on the 

 coasts in some seasons, its visits are uncertain, for in 1868-69-70 I saw nothing of it at Colombo. It most 

 probably wanders over the Indian Ocean in vast flocks, visiting various localities en route. 



Like the last, this species has a very wide intertropical range, but does not seem to be found in central- 

 Atlantic localities, like the Sooty Tern; for though it is recorded from Honduras and the West Indies, and 

 from the west coast of Africa, I do not find any mention of its occurrence at Ascension or other Atlantic 

 islands ; and it has not strayed into Europe, like the latter bird. In the Indian Ocean, from the east coast of 

 Africa, Madagascar, Mauritius, Reunion, and Seychelles, across to Western Australia and northward to Bombay 

 and the Bay of Bengal, it is perhaps more abundant than in any other seas. It breeds in great numbers on 

 the Vingorla rocks off the Bombay coast, and thence no doubt visits Ceylon. It has been met with between 

 Bombay and Ivurrachee, and in the Bay of Bengal it occurs on all the islands in the monsoons. In the 

 Mergui archipelago it is believed to have been seen, but nowhere else on the coast of Tenasserim. In the 

 Malay islands it is recorded from Sumatra, Java, Borneo (Pontianak), Moluccas, and Celebes; and from the 

 Philippines it was made known by Sonnerat. It has been met with on the south coast of New Guinea, in 

 Torres Straits, at Port Darwin, Cape York, Rockingham Bay, down the whole of the east coast to Victoria, 

 and thence to South Australia ; and on the coasts of Western Australia it breeds at the Houtrnann's Abrolhos. 

 It is found at some of the Pacific islands, including the Sandwich, also the Fiji group, where Layard has 



