DIOMEDEA EXULANS. 



and again between the islands of South Trinidad and Tristan da Cunha, as 

 well as near Montevideo, in Lat. 33° S., Long. 50° 3' W. It has been observed 

 in the Straits of Magellan, and a specimen obtained near Valparaiso by Captain Brett 

 is in the British Museum (Salvin, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., XXV., p. 443). 



Mr. Nicoll was informed that it nested on Inaccessible Island in the Tristan da 

 Cunha group (Ibis, 1906, p. 675). Mr. F. Stoltenhof, who resided on Tristan 

 for two years, says that the Albatroses alighted on the highest portion of 

 Inaccessible Island in the latter part of November, avoiding the high tussock 

 grass, from which they rise with difficulty. They made a circular nest, slightly 

 concave at the top, about three feet high, and broader at the bottom (Baird, 

 Brewer, and Bidgway, Water-Birds N. Amer., p. 349). Mr. Comer states that 

 D. exulans is common on Gough Island and breeds there, laying at the end of 

 December, eggs being plentiful by the 3rd of January. He considered that the 

 Gough Island birds were smaller than those from Kerguelen Island, and the 

 South Orkneys (Verrill, Tr. Conn. Acad., IX., p. 437, 1895). I have not been 

 able to examine specimens from Tristan da Cunha and Gough Island, and 

 cannot state whether the Albatros from these Islands is D. exulans or D. 

 chionoptera. 



Sufficient evidence has, however, been brought forward to enable us to trace the 

 range of D. exulans in the Southern Oceans, and to show that it is a bird of 

 very wide distribution. The only authentic nesting-places of the species are 

 Antipodes Island and other islands of the New Zealand area, as the other 

 accounts of the breeding of D. exulans refer either to D. regia or D. chionoptera* 



The Wandering Albatros has been reported to occur in European waters on 

 several occasions, but it would be well to re-examine the specimens which have 

 been preserved, as some other species may have been mistaken for D. exulans, 

 which seldom, if ever, crosses the Equator. It has been said to occur in Tampa 

 Bay, Florida, and off the coast of Washington, but these records are both 

 unsatisfactory (A. 0. U. Checklist, 2nd ed., p. 326, 1895). Mr. J. F. Green says 

 (Ocean Birds, p. 4) that he knows of several instances of Albatroses having been 

 conveyed across the Line in a ship, and allowed to fly on the northern side. 

 Such birds would be likely to take a northerly course, which might account for 

 the occurrence of the species in Europe, but I think in all probability this obser- 

 vation refers to Mollymawks. 



In Professor Reichenow's memoir on the birds of the German South Polar 

 Expedition, we are told by Dr. Hiisker that the Albatros flies with extraordinary 

 rapidity, and glides through the air like a ship under sail. On seeing any object 

 it fancies, it becomes restless, drops its legs, thrusts forward the fore-part of the 

 body in a clumsy manner, drawing in its neck at the same time, and thus drops to 

 the water, hovering a moment with outstretched wings until the balance is recovered. 



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