682: SOOTY TERN. 
SOOTY TERN. —STERNA FULIGINOSA. —Fice. 305. 
La hirondelle de mer 4 grande enverguer, Buff. viii. p. 345. — Egg-Bird, Foret. 
Voy. p. 113, — Noddy” Damp. Voy. li, p. 142,— Aret. Zool. No. 447. — Lath 
Syn. iii. p. 352. — Peule’s Museum, No. 3459. 
STERNA FULIGINOSA.— LatHaM. 
S. fuliginosa, Bonup. Synop. p. 355. 
Tuis bird has been long known to navigators, as its appearance at 
sea usually indicates the vicinity of land; instances, however, have 
occurred, in which they have been met with one hundred leagues from 
shore.* The species is widely dispersed over the various shores of the 
ocean. They were seen by Dampier in New Holland; are in pro- 
digious numbers in the Island of Ascension and in Christmas Island ; 
are said to lay, in December, one egg on the ground; the egg is yel- 
lowish, with brown and violet spots.t In passing along the northern 
shores of Cuba, and the coast of Florida and Georgia, in the month of 
July, I observed this species very numerous and noisy, dashing down 
headlong after small fish. I shot and dissected several, and found 
their stomachs uniformly filled with fish. I could perceive little or no 
* difference between the colors of the male and female. 
Length of the Sooty Tern, seventeen inches ; extent, three feet six 
inches ; bill, an inch and a half long, sharp-pointed and rounded above, 
the upper mandible serrated slightly near the point; nostril, an oblong 
slit; color of the bill, glossy black ; irides, dusky ; forehead, as far as 
the eyes, white ; whole lower parts and sides of the neck, pure white ; 
rest of the plumage, black ; wings, very long and pointed, extending, 
when shut, nearly to the extremity of the tail, which is greatly forked, 
and consists of twelve feathers, the two exterior ones four inches 
longer than those of the middle, the whole of a deep black, except the 
two outer feathers, which are white, but towards the extremities 3 
little blackish on the inner vanes ; legs and webbed feet, black ; hind 
toe, short. 
The secondary wing feathers are eight inches shorter than the 
longest primary. ; 
This bird frequently settles on the rigging of ships at sea, and, in 
common with another species, S. stolida, is called by sailors the Noddy 
* Coor, Voyage, i. p. 275 + TuRTON. 
