THE GREAT BLACK-HEADED GULL. 
415 
plumage and tail pure white; back, rump, scapulars and wing-coverts 
bluish grey ; primary- coverts and quills white, the earlier primaries 
with a black band near the tip, the first primary with the whole outer web 
black ; the secondaries and tertiaries gradually turning to bluish grey on 
the inner webs and finally over the whole feather, and all broadly tipped 
with white. 
In winter the head becomes white, the nape and sides of the head 
streaked with grey, and there is a black line in front of the eye. 
The young, as commonly observed in Burmah, have the head white 
mottled with brown ; neck pale fulvescent brown, extending in spots to 
the sides of the breast ; back, scapulars and wing-coverts mingled brown 
and ashy ; upper tail-coverts white ; tail with the basal two thirds white, 
the remainder black tipped with white ; primaries very dark brown, the 
first six with some white on the inner webs near their bases, the others 
with more white, some of it extending to the outer webs; secondaries 
broadly edged with white ; tertiaries ashy tipped with white ; the shafts of 
all the quills dark brown. 
Lddes brown ; edges of the eyelids and gape vermilion ; bill wax-yellow^ 
vermilion tov/ards the tip, with a black bar across both mandibles just 
beyond the angle of the gonys, and the extreme tips beyond this orange- 
yellow. [Hume.) 
In the young the iris is dark brown; edges of eyelids black; gape and 
basal half of the margins pale yellowish ; remainder of the bill very dark 
brown ; legs, feet and webs pale purplish brown ; claws black. 
Length about 29 inches, tail 7*5, wing 19*5, tarsus 3*2, bill from gape 
3*8. The immature bird measures : length 26 inches, tail 6*6, wing 18*6, 
tarsus 2*85, bill from forehead 2*2. 
The Great Black-headed Gull occurs in the winter in various parts of 
Burmah. I noticed it to be abundant in the Sittang river every year, and 
numbers used to come and visit the Pegu Canal and the large ponds in 
connection with it. Neither Mr. Davison nor Dr. Armstrong appear to 
have observed it on the coast ; but Mr. Blyth records it from the island 
of Ramree, and Mr. Shopland sent me a specimen shot in the Akyab 
harbour. 
It is found over the whole of India and Ceylon, and it extends through 
Western Asia into Europe and North-east Africa ; it is also recorded from 
Japan, and probably it will be found in China. Mr. Swarries, the taxider- 
mist of the Phayre Museum at Rangoon, procured many fine specimens in 
full breeding-plumage at Bhamo, 600 miles up the Irrawaddy river. Its 
breeding-haunts appear to be the Caspian Sea and neighbouring regions. 
It is said to lay its eggs on sand-banks. 
Like many other Gulls this species is found inland quite as frequently 
as on the coast. On the Sittang river I have observed as many as twenty 
