NATATORES. 



405 



" This bird was frequently seen within the torrid zone, in the Pacific 

 Ocean. A single specimen was obtained at the Island of Upolu, from 

 a native, who represented to us that during the breeding season this 

 species lives in holes, very high up in the mountains." 



The plate of our Atlas, cited above, represents this bird of the size 

 of life. According- to the Prince Bonaparte, this species belongs to 

 the genus Oceanites, Keyserling and Blasius, which includes also 

 Thalassidi'oma Wilsoni. In his Monograph of this group, in Conspec- 

 tus Avium, II, p. 199, it is stated that specimens of the present species 

 are in the Imperial Museum at Paris, having been brought from the 

 South Pacific Ocean by the Expedition in the Astrolabe. One speci- 

 men only is in the present collection. 



3. Thalassidroma furcata (Gm.). — The Fork-tailed Petrel. 



Procellaria furcata, G-M. Syst. Nat. I, p. 561 (1788). 

 Procellaria orientalis, Pall. Zoog. Ross. As. II, p. 315 (1811). 

 " Thalassidroma plumbea, Peale, MS." Peale, Zool. Exp. Exp. Birds, p. 292 

 (1848). 



Gray, Gen. Ill, Plate CLXXVIII ; Cassin, B. of Cal. & Tex. I, 

 Plate XLVI 5 Yoy. Sulphur, Birds, Plate XXXIII. 



This handsome little Petrel, though accurately described by Pen- 

 nant, in Arctic Zoology, II, p. 255, and on the faith of whose descrip- 

 tion Gmelin gave the scientific name as above, had been almost lost 

 sight of by later ornithologists, until noticed by the naturalists of H. 

 B. M. Ship Sulphur, and by those of the present Expedition in the 

 Vincennes and Peacock. 



In the Zoology of the Voyage of the Sulphur (Birds, p. 50, London, 

 1844), this bird is stated to have been obtained at Sitka, in Russian 

 America, though nothing is given relating to its history. The speci- 

 mens in the collection of the Expedition are from the coast of Oregon, 

 where this species was observed not uncommonly, and therefore de- 

 monstrated to be entitled to admission into the Ornithological Fauna 

 of the United States. 



To Dr. Pickering we have again to acknowledge our obligations for 

 a notice of this bird. First recording its occurrence on the 26th of 



102 



