AVIFAUNA OF LAYS AN. 



55 



26. DIOMEDEA CHINENSIS, 2W 



BEOWN GOOKEY". 



Albatros de la Chine, Daubcnt. PL Enl. 9G3 (1770). 



Diomedea chinensis, Temm. Man. d'Orn. 2nd ed. i. p. 110 (1820) (based on PI. Enl. 963). 

 Diomedea brachyura, Temm. PI. Col. v. livr. 94, pi. 554 (1835) (based on PI. Enl. 903, but figure and descrip- 

 tion of D. albatrus) . 

 Diomedea deroyata, Swinh. P. Z. S. 1873, p. 786 (China). 



The quite adult bird is dark sooty brown above ; the forehead much paler, dirty white in most 

 of them, the hind part of the crown is darker, with a blackish line behind the eye. Below 

 much paler and more greyish ; the feathers more or less distinctly bordered with sandy 

 buff ; anal region, and in some specimens a few of the upper tail-coverts, dirty white, 

 or at least much paler. Quills and tail-feathers blackish brown, the shafts of the quills 

 straw-yellow. Bill dark brown, base and tip blackish ; legs and feet black ; iris dark brown. 

 Total length about 33 inches, wing 19 to 19'G, tail 57, tarsus 33, bill from gape 4r4 



There is no doubt whatever that Temminck's name D. chinensis has the precedence over 

 the same author's D. brachiura (corr. brachyura), bestowed also on the PI. Enl. 963 in 

 1835, that is fifteen years later. In the PI. Col., moreover, Temminck figures and describes 

 another species, D. albatrus, Pall. 



I am much obliged to Mr. Salvin, our great authority on Tubinares, for pointing out to 

 me the differences between D. albatrus and _Z). brachyura (or rather I), chinensis as it should 

 be called), for these two species have hitherto been considered to be the old and young of 

 one species by most ornithologists, although Swinhoe clearly said that his D. derogata were 

 fully adult birds. There is, indeed, no doubt that the dark form is not an immature bird. 



On French Frigate Island, Laysan, and all the other islands visited by my collector, the 

 dark Albatross was fairly numerous, but far less abundant than the white D. immutabilis. 

 The two species always kept apart from each other. On Laysan the breeding-place of the 

 dark Albatross was on the south side of the island, where they sat on the beach with their 

 young. The young feed by putting their beaks crossways into the old birds' mow and 

 catching the cast-up fish. 



(The photograph shows the breeding-colony on the south of Laysan Island. 

 Unfortunately the Plate of this species was lettered before the synonymy was quite 

 finished; and so on the Plate the name of Diomedea brachyura, instead of D. chinensis, 

 ^ appears, D. chinensis being undoubtedly the older and therefore correct name.) 



