168 GULL. 



being like the words Lab lab, has probably given rise to one of the 

 names by which it is known : it principally feeds on herrings, and 

 the place where the shoals of these fish are, to be known by the birds 

 being in great numbers hovering over the spot. Buffon mentions two 

 of them being forced on the Coast of Picardy, in a storm, in the 

 month of November, 1779. 



There seems also a further uncertainty in respect to the above 

 bird, for we cannot well reconcile the one having the two middle tail 

 feathers one inch longer than the rest, when in the other the tail is 

 merely rounded at the end, and if we do not comprehend the matter 

 amiss, can only arise from difference of sex, unless on future investi- 

 gation the whole may turn out no more than that the Black-toed, 

 and its varieties, are only in the progressive stages towards perfection 

 of the Arctic Gull. 



26— KEEASK GULL. 



Larus Keeask, Jnd. Orn. ii. 818. 



Keeask, Arct. Zool. ii. App. p. 71. Gen. Syn. vi. p. 389. 



LENGTH twenty-three inches, breadth four feet ; weight two 

 pounds and a half. Bill black; three inches long; head, neck, 

 breast, and belly, uniform brown ; prime quills black ; wing coverts 

 and scapulars brown, marked with white ; tail black, speckled, and 

 tipped with white. 



Inhabits Hudson's Bay, comes there in April, makes a slight 

 nest of grass, and lays two pale, ferruginous eggs, spotted with 

 black : as the winter comes on, it retreats to open water, and is there 

 known by the name of Keeask. It seems nearly to approach to 

 the Skua ; and Mr. Hutchins, who furnished the above account 

 observes, that half the toes and webs are black. 



