RYNCHOPS. 49 
black. Winter adult: Similar as to plumage, but the black more brownish, 
and interrupted by a white collar across hind-neck. Young: Above light 
buff, each feather with a central spot of black, these largest on scapulars; 
lores and beneath eye uniform pale buff; lower parts white. Downy young: 
Above pale grayish buff, irregularly and sparsely mottled with blackish ; lower 
parts plain white. (Lower mandible not longer than upper in very young 
birds.) Length 17.00-20.00, wing 14.75-15.75, tail 5.50 (forked for about 
1.20), culmen 2.20-2.80, lower mandible 2.90-4.10. Mest a depression in sand, 
near sea-shore. Eggs 2-5, 1.74 x 1.32, ovate, or short-ovate, white, buffy 
white, or pale buff, marked with large bold spots of rich dark or deep brown, 
and smaller, fainter spots of purplish gray. -Hab. Sea-coast of warmer parts 
of America; on the Atlantic side, north, regularly, to New Jersey, casually 
to Nova Scotia......cccscscsseees eeacctoupets 80. R. nigra Linn. Black Skimmer. 
a’, Secondaries without white tips; tail dusky, the feathers with paler edges ; under 
wing-coverts brownish gray; otherwise similar to 2. nigra, but averaging 
larger, with longer bill and wing especially. Hab. Coasts of South America 
(Peru; Demerara, etc.). 
R. melanura Bortz. Black-tailed Skimmer.! 
1 Rynchope melanurue “ Bork,” Swans. Anim. in Menag. 1838, 340. 
as 
