Birds. 3691 



Some Account of a Petrel, killed at Southacre, Norfolk ; with a 

 Description and Synonymy. By Alfred Newton, Esq. 



The bird represented in the engraving at page 3693, was observed 

 by a boy on a heath at Southacre, near Swaffham in Norfolk, flap- 

 ping for some time from one furze-bush to another ; at length it got 

 into one of the bushes, and was then secured by him: exhausted as it 

 was, it had strength enough remaining to bite violently the hand of 

 its captor, who thereupon killed it. Mr. Netvcome, of Hockwold Hall, 

 near Brandon, fortunately happened at the time to be kawking in the 

 neighbourhood of Swaffham, and his falconer, John Madden, observ- 

 ing the boy with the dead bird, procured it from him and brought it to 

 his master, by whom it was skinned and mounted, and in whose pos- 

 session it now is. This took place in March or April, 1850. In 

 my ignorance of the appearance of the fulmar in its immature stage 

 of plumage, and my unwillingness to consider that a wonder had been 

 met with, I considered the subject of this paper to be a specimen of 

 the young of that bird ; but happening shortly after to see an indivi- 

 dual of that species, I at once perceived the error I had fallen into, 

 but by that time the bird had been inclosed in a case with others, and 

 Mr. Newcome was unwilling to take it out in order to submit it to the 

 inspection of competent judges. However, in May last, that gen- 

 tleman was prevailed upon to send it to Mr. Yarrell, who not only 

 at once saw that it was new to the British Fauna, but was unable to 

 identify it with any described species. Mr. Gould, also, who in- 

 spected it at Mr. YarreH's house, was equally undecided as to whe- 

 ther or not it had been described, but recognized it as a species he 

 had seen on the wing in crossing the Atlantic. Being in London in 

 July last, I thought I discovered a strong likeness between a stuffed 

 specimen then in the Museum of the Zoological Society and Mr. 

 Newcome's bird ; on my return into Suffolk, therefore, I obtained 

 this latter individual, and forwarded a sketch of it to Mr. Bartlett, 

 accompanied by a request that he would inform me whether the two 

 examples appeared to him to belong to the same species. After some 

 delay, arising from the fact that in the interval the specimen I had 

 noticed had been transferred by the Zoological Society to the British 

 Museum, Mr. Bartlett, on the 7th of September, returned me an an- 

 swer in the affirmative ; further stating that the species had been figured 

 in No. 416 of the ' Planches Coloriees,' under the name of Procel- 

 laria hasitata ; and also, what appeared to him rather singular (for I 



