351 



Norway it is not unfrequently to be met with ; and Mr. Collett informs me that immature 

 specimens occur every winter off the coast of Finmark down to Tromso, but that adult birds are 

 seldom seen south of the arctic circle, only stragglers being met with. It has been shot in the 

 winter at Trondhjem, Stordalen, near Bergen, and at Karmo, off Stavanger. The last example 

 procured was shot near Christiansand in 1872, and is now preserved in the Trondhjem Museum. 

 In the Baltic it is of extremely rare occurrence. Professor Nilsson states that one was shot near 

 Gene in February 1853, and that Malmlen killed one in 1848 near Gothenburg. It has been 

 recorded from the northern portions of Finland. Dr. Palmen. says that examples were seen 

 several years in the late autumn at the Pallasjarvi lake, in Kittila; and a young bird was 

 obtained in October 1866, and one, according to Knobloch, in the late autumn of 1872. It 

 doubtless occurs on the northern shores of Eussia ; but I lack information on this head. It is, 

 however, common in Novaya Zemlya and Spitsbergen. Von Heuglin found it singly in the 

 Matotschkin Scharr in August; but further to the eastward it appears, he says, to be wanting. 

 In Spitsbergen it is, Professor Malmgren says, very common ; and Professor Newton writes (Ibis, 

 1865, p. 507) that there " it is, of all others, the bird of which any visitor to Spitsbergen will 

 carry away the keenest recollection. One can only wish that a creature so fair to look upon was 

 not so foul a feeder. In my preceding notes, I have already several times mentioned this species. 

 I have only now to add that, contrary to the experience of almost all other observers, I once saw 

 an Ivory Gull of its own accord deliberately settle on the water and swim. This was in the Stor 

 Fjord. There is a very great variation in the size of different specimens of this bird, which is 

 not at all to be attributed to the sex, or, I think, to age ; but I do not for a moment countenance 

 the belief in a second species, which some ornithologists have endeavoured to establish under the 

 name of ' P. brachytarsa.' " To the southward in Europe the Ivory Gull has been met with as a 

 rare straggler as far as the coasts of Germany and Holland ; and, according to Naumann, one 

 was obtained, on the 10th March 1817, as far south as the Lake of Geneva. It is recorded 

 from Denmark by Kjserbolling, who says that, according to Hage, two were shot at Kallebod- 

 strand some years ago ; and Benicken states that it was previously shot in Schleswig. I do not 

 find any instance of its occurrence in Holland or Belgium ; and Messrs. Degland and Gerbe 

 merely say that it appears accidentally in France, without giving any further details. 



I have no data respecting its occurrence on the northern shores of Asia ; and it is not 

 mentioned by Von Middendorff. Mr. Swinhoe (Ibis, 1875, p. 140) says that he saw a white 

 Gull near Chefoo, which he took to be an Ivory Gull ; but I cannot but think that he was 

 mistaken. 



In North America, however, the present species is not uncommon. Sir John Bichardson 

 says (Faun. Bor.-Am. ii. p. 419) that it frequents Davis's Straits, Baffin's Bay, and various parts 

 of the northern shores of the American continent. He observed it breeding in great numbers on 

 the high cliffs perforated with holes which form the extremity of Cape Parry, in 70° N. lat. I am 

 indebted to Captain H. W. Feilden, naturalist to the ' Alert,' for the following notes made by him 

 on the recent Arctic expedition :— " In 1875, I first observed this species on the 24th July, whilst 

 passing through the middle pack of Baffin's Bay. They were tolerably common in the North-water. 

 In August I found several pairs associating with Glaucous Gulls in Payer Harbour, a little to 

 the south of Cape Sabine. An adult male killed at this place had iris dark hair-brown, eyelid 



