ORNITHOLOGY. 



ihdt answer to the Larus Glaucus of LiNN^EUS.*^ Herd 

 the confusion becomes in an eminent degree increased, for Linncvus 

 has no such bird as Larus Glaucus ! and we must confess 

 we are at a loss to afford this passage any probable interpreta- 

 tion. It could scarcely be intended that only two of those birds in 

 the adult state had occurred, and those females, for we are perfectly 

 aware, upon other authority, that at least several of those birds in 

 the adult state, as well males as females, were killed in that expedi^ 

 tlon and brought to England by the officers. 



From every information that we have been enabled to collect, the 

 Glaucous Gull is found in all the higher northern latitudes as far as 

 as 70 degrees, and much of the confusion that has arisen respecting 

 the species appears to have originated from the different Appearances 

 which the plumage assumes in the various stages of its growth, the 

 species undergoing the same changes as are observed in other species 

 of the Gull tribe, in addition to the more complete and decided change 

 which marks the severer season of the arctic winter^ for at that 

 period it is said to become almost pure white, losing the 

 distinctive character of the black marks or colouring of the quiU 

 feathers, and retaining only the cinereous plumage of the backw 

 The young of the Larus Glaucus are clouded and spotted with 

 brown, those marks or spots disappearing in its progressive change 

 towards the adult state in the same manner as we observe in the 

 progressive growth of other birds of the same tribe. In the mature 

 Mate the Glaucous Gull may be considered in point of size as holding 

 a middle station between the Larus Marinus or Black-backed Gull 

 and the Herring-gull (Larus Fuscus). The specimen of the 

 Glaucous Gull which we have now before us rather exceeds in mag- 

 VOL* II. G G 



