414 
BIEDS OF BRITISH BURMAH. 
dark brown_, the primaries with the shafts and bases of the feathers 
white. 
The young are uniform sooty brown_, each feather edged pale ; and the 
lower abdomen, vent and under tail-coverts are broadly barred with 
alternate bands of brown and white_, and the tips of the feathers are 
rufescent. 
Bill dark horn^ bluish at the base ; iris brown ; legs blackish. 
[Dy^esser.) 
Length about 21 inches,, tail about 8, the central pair of feathers pro- 
jecting beyond the others rather more than 2 inches^ wing 14^ tarsus 2^ 
bill from gape 2"4. 
A specimen of the Pomatorhine Skua was obtained by Col. Tickell 
from some boys who had killed it in a field near Moulmein. It was 
adult, and there is no reason to doubt Col. TickelFs identification of the 
bird. 
It is an inhabitant of the northern portions of Europe, Asia and 
America, wandering at times far south, for specimens have been obtained 
at the Cape of Good Hope and at Cape York in Australia. 
The Skuas are of rapacious habits, living chiefly by robbing other sea- 
birds of their prey. They have comparatively little white on their 
plumage^ the prevailing colour being dark brown ; but many of the species, 
when adult, have yellow necks. 
B. antarcticus is said to have occurred in Ceylon ; but Major Legge 
treats it as a doubtful visitor to that island. 
Subfamily LARIN^. 
Genus LAEUS, Linn. 
754. LAEUS ICHTHYAETUS. 
THE GREAT BLACK-HEADED GULL. 
Larus ichthyaetus, Pall. Reis. Russ. Reichs, ii. p. 713; Dresser, Birds Ew\ 
viii. p. 369, pi.; Hume, S. F. i. p. 276 ; Bl. B. Burm. p. 162 ; Saunders, P. Z. 
1878, p. 198; Hume, S. F. viii. p. 115; Zer/ge, Birds Ceylon, i^. 1046; Oates, 
S. F. X. p. 246. Kroikocephalus ichthyaetus, Jerd. B. Ind. iii. p. 831. 
Description, — Summer plumage. The whole head and upper neck black ; 
the feathers on the eyelids white ; remainder of the neck, the whole lower 
