PHCEBETRIA FULIGINOSA. 



by the expedition beyond 58° S., though it is known to extend rather further. 

 Bernachi asserts that P. cornicoides was occasionally encountered in the pack ice, 

 and tins statement is corroborated by other travellers. 



There are twenty specimens of the " Sooty Albatros " in the British Museum 

 collection, ten of the dark form, and a similar number of the pale bird. In the dark 

 form (P. fuliginosa), the streak occupying the groove in the lower mandible is of a 

 conspicuous straw-colour, whereas in the pale phase (P. cornicoides) the groove is 

 narrower and shorter, and the streak is of a dark colour. On some of the labels it is 

 described as having been blue in life, a colour which would no doubt fade after death. 

 This character, if constant, would be a further indication for the separation of the 

 two forms, but, unfortunately, one of the specimens obtained by the " Southern Cross " 

 Expedition is labelled as having a white mandibular stripe, though in the dry skin the 

 stripe has no appearance of having been of this colour. Dr. Hartert, moreover, informs 

 me that the Tring Museum contains four skins of the pale coloured phase, three of 

 which have a dark stripe, similar to those in the British Museum, but in the fourth, 

 a typical P. cornicoides from the Otago Coast (Buller Coll.), the stripe is as yellow as in 

 P. fuliginosa. Hutton also mentioned that he had a bird of the pale form in which 

 the streak on the under mandible was white, but this statement he afterwards 

 withdrew in a letter to Mr. Eagle Clarke (Ibis, 1905, p. 267). The bills in our ten 

 specimens average slightly larger than those of P. cornicoides, but as all the other 

 measurements are practically the same, I do not attach much importance to this. Mr. 

 Eagle Clarke has lent me coloured drawings of the two species, taken from freshly 

 lolled specimens; both have a black bill, but in P. fuliginosa the streak occupying 

 the groove of the lower mandible is of a yellowish straw-colour, while hi that of 

 P. cornicoides it is of a delicate pale blue. The evidence on this point is conflicting, 

 and the matter can only be satisfactorily cleared up by careful observations made 

 on the freshly killed birds. 



Gould says that the P. fuliginosa is one of the commonest Albatroses, and 

 is universally distributed over all the temperate latitudes south of the equator, but 

 as before noticed, he did not recognise a second species, and therefore it is uncertain 

 to which form his remarks refer. He noticed it as far north as Lat. 31° 10' S., 

 Long. 34° W., and records that it was seen constantly between the island of St. Paul 

 and Tasmania, as well as in the Pacific near Cape Horn, and was still more abundant 

 in the Atlantic in Lat. 41° S., Long. 34° W. According to him the cuneate tail, together 

 with the small and slight legs and delicate structure, indicate that it is the most aerial 

 species of the genus [Diomedea], and that its flight differs materially from that of other 

 Albatroses. 



The nest is of mud, raised five or six inches from the ground, slightly depressed 

 on the top, and usually placed in cliffs difficult of access ; it is also recorded as 

 occasionally breeding in societies. The young bird when half grown is covered with a 



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