192 PROCEEDINGS OF THE [Jan., 1888. 



elegmis. This table shows the relative differences of proportions, the lengths 

 being in inches and fractions thereof. 



The Royal Tern is one of the commonest in our Harbor, in the sense, that, 

 like the poor, it is always with ns ; though in regard to the number of individ- 

 uals to be seen at any one time, it cannot compete with the Least Tern, or 

 mth Wilson's Tern, or Forster's, during the migrations. But "Winter, Spring, 

 and Summer alike know the loud, harsh and not altogether unmusical cry of S. 

 maxima. In the Autumn we have seen great numbers of them resting on 

 the sand bars in our Harbor, especially the reefs near Fort Sumter and Castle 

 Pinckney. They breed regularly on ' ' Bird Keys, " near Kiawah Island, and 

 formerly bred on Long Island, North of Sullivan's. As far as our observation, 

 which is necessarily very limited, extends, July seems the month when the eggs 

 are in the greatest profusion, though we have no evidence to show that they 

 have not an earlier brood, except that we have never seen the young in the 

 month when we have seen the eggs. They lay two eggs, and sometimes three. 

 There is no attempt at a nest, merely a hollow scooped in the sand. At one 

 time on Bird Key about fifty eggs of this species were found, the nests being 

 so close together that a circle of two yards radius would have contained them 

 all. 



Like all large birds, our Tern is very careful of himself, and is one of the 

 first to take wing, on the approach of a suspicious character, from the miscella- 

 neous assemblage of sea-birds that gather on the sand bars left bare at low tide. 

 With an extent of wing of some forty-three inches, and a muscular power capa- 

 ble of exercising such a spread to the best advantage, his flight, though less 

 airy than the Least Tern, is inferior in powerful elegance to none. We have 

 seen Sterna maxima match himself against the Bald Eagle, and follow, harras- 

 sing him, for some distance ; and that, too, in December, a time when there 

 was no excuse in the way of eggs or young, which serves to warrant such a dis- 

 play of courage even in the weakest bird. 



AVhere the waves of the wild Atlantic, now mad mth Winter frenzy, now soft 

 and -gentle in the Summer breeze, wash the white rimmed coast of our Southern 

 islands, and the dark palmetto adds a tropical gleam to the landscape, there is 

 the home of Sterna maxima. Our sea coast would indeed lack a charm if de- 

 prived of the coral beak and black and silver plumage of this King of the 

 Terns. 



