344 RECREATIONS OF A NATURALIST 



Inst., 1889, p. 126, and Zoologist, 1889, p. 337), 

 gives the following dimensions of some that he 

 measured : Total length from tip of bill to end of 

 tail, 3 feet 3 in. ; bill 7 in. ; tail, 7J in. ; whole wing, 

 from 4 feet 10 in. to 5 feet 10 in. ; primaries, i foot 

 8 in. ; whole leg, i foot 10 in. ; tarsus, 4^- in. ; middle 

 toe, 7 in. By the expression "whole wing" is 

 evidently intended the length from the body (not 

 from the carpal joint) to the end of the longest 

 primary, just as the expression "whole leg'' 

 includes more than the tarsus. 



Out of more than a hundred specimens of the 

 large Albatross {D. exulans) caught and measured 

 by Mr J. F. Green (see his Ocean Birds, p. 5), 

 the largest was 1 1 feet. 4 in. from tip to tip. This, 

 he says, was confirmed by the experience of a ship's 

 captain, who in forty years had never found one 

 over that length. As this bears out the observa- 

 tions of Dr Bennett and Mr Sanford, we may take 

 it that 1 1 feet represents the normal expanse of wing 

 in a fully adult bird of this species. 



Captain F- W. Hutton, who has paid much 

 attention to the problem of flight, has contributed 

 to The Ibis for January 1903 an instructive paper 

 on the flight of Albatrosses, with figures reproduced 

 from photographs of these huge birds on the wing. 

 He endorses the statement made by Gould that 

 the average weight of the Wandering Albatross 

 is 17 lb. 



The following table will render possible a ready 

 comparison of the species named : — 



