DETAILED LIST OF BIRDS, 
299 
The eggs are moderately elongated ovals^ much pointed 
at both ends, though rather more so at one end than the 
other. The texture is fairly close^ but still slightly chalky, 
and they rarely have more than the faintest gloss. When 
first laid they are white, faintly tinged with blue or green. 
In Europe the eggs are said to be pure white, but in India 
all the eggs I have seen had when quite freshly laid a faint 
bluish green tinge. Owing to the bird^s habit of covering 
the eggs over with wet, muddy water weeds, the eggs 
become rapidly discoloured, turning green, dingy yellowish 
brown, and then dark earthy brown, like an old addled 
vulture^s egg, or a hard set Coromandel Shell-eater^s. 
In length they vary from 1'28 to 1'45, and in breadth 
from 0*88 to 1"1 ; but the average of thirty-six eggs measured 
was 1-35 by 0 98. [A. O. H.] 
978 {bis). Lams argentatus,* Gmel. 
Two young specimens of this species were obtained early 
in November in the Wuller Lake, Kashmir. [G. H.] 
From all that I have heard, I believe that it breeds in 
this locality. It is, doubtless, a very southern habitat, but 
I have been assured of the fact by sportsmen who professed 
to have eaten the eggs, which they said were the size of a 
gooseys. 
* Larus argentatus. 
Dimensions. — Length, 22 to liG. Wing, 17*5 to 18-5. Tail from 
vent, 7'5 to 8"5 ; expanse, 53 to 68. Tarsus, 2*4 to 2*7. (The females 
are smaller than the males.) 
Description. — Adult. Bill yellow with a reddish band tov/ards the 
tip of the lower mandible. Feet, fleshy pink. Claws, blackish horny. 
Iris, yellowish white. 
Plumage. — Head, neck, and upper tail- coverts, chin, throat, breast, and 
in fact entire lower parts and tail, are white. The head, neck, and sides 
of the neck faintly streaked with brownish grey in winter, which streaks, 
however, disappear before they leave us in April. Back and wings pale 
bluish grey, tlie latter white near the carpal joint, and, with the exterior 
six primaries, more or less broadly tipped with greyish black, the first 
primary almost to its base, the second for about two-thirds of its length, 
the sixth for only, perhaps, an inch. Both primaries and secondaries 
are more or le^s broadly tipped with white. In some specimens the white 
tippings to the first quill are fully an inch and a half broad, and above 
