176 RARE VISITANTS. 



believing it to be a valid species. But there can be 

 little doubt that the name capistratus has been be- 

 stowed upon a small specimen of L. ridibundus in a 

 transitional or accidental state of plumage ; cf. Thomp- 

 son, Nat. Hist. Irel. (Bu-ds), vol. iii. pp. 334-340. 



Fam. PROCELLARID^. 



DUSKY SHEAEWATEE. Puffinus obscurus (Gmelin). 



Hab. West coast of Africa to Cape of Good Hope ; rare ia 

 the Mediterranean. 



OnCj Valentia Harbour, co. Kerry, 11th May 1853 : Yarrell, 



Hist. Brit. Birds, vol. iii. p. 659. In the collection of 



Mrs. Blackburn. 

 One, Earsham, near Bungay, Suffolk, 10th April 1858 : 



Stevenson, Zoologist, 1858, p. 6096. 

 One taken alive, mouth of the Ouse, near Lynn, 26th July, 



1851 : Southwell, Naturalist, 1851, p. 189. In the Lynn 



Museum. This is the young off. wjo/or. J. H. Gumey, MS. 

 A pair taken alive, Plymouth Sound, 11th Dec. 1852 : Banker, 



Naturalist, 1853, p. 204. 

 One, near Berry Head, South Devon, Feb. 1869 : De Hiigel, 



Zoologist, 1869, p. 1720. 



Obs. Under the head of Cinereous or Dusky Shear- 

 water, certain birds of this genus have been recorded 

 as above ; but it is extremely doubtful whether they 

 are all of one species, P. obscurvs, Gmelin. On the 

 contrary, I suspect that only the first on the list is 

 of that species, and that the others are either the young 

 of P. major {cf. antea, p. 79), perhaps in the plumage 

 of the specimen described as y^t^z^iosws by Strickland 



