3oG 
LARID-E. 
THE POMAEIXE SKUA. 
Lestris pomarinus. 
[Unlike the last-named species, the Pomarine Skua appears 
to be found in Shetland only in the winter season. It is not 
mentioned in Thomas Edmondston’s list, though it has a place 
in Messrs Baikie and Heddle’s Orkney catalogue ; nor does it 
seem to have been recognised in Shetland until 1861, when 
the author procured, in company with the skins of the Goshawk 
and Hawk Owl, the skin of a specimen which was said to have 
been shot, like the rest, at Scaa, in Unst, in the preceding 
winter, somewhere about Christmas 1860. Another specimen 
was shot by the Eev. Z. Hamilton, in Bressay Sound, a little 
before Christmas 1862. Xo other allusions to this species 
occur in the journals. — E d.] 
THE AECTIC OE EICHAEDSOX’S SKUA. 
Lestris parasiticus. 
SHOOI — BOATSWAIN. * 
The remarks made on the times of migration of the Great 
Skua will equally apply to this species, even, oddly enough, 
to the fact that the one instance of a belated bird, seen out of 
all ordinary rule, was on a 27th of September, though seven 
years earlier. The Shooi is very far more numerous than its 
illustrious congener, and is the very sauciest bird in all the 
sky, not even excepting the iMerlins and the Piccatarries. It 
is not every bird that can enjoy a joke, and the Shooi really 
* I have heard this name applied to the bird on the west coast of Shetland, 
hut it has most likely been imported by sailors, who fancy, in the dealings of 
the predatory birds toward the Gulls, an analogy for their own occasional 
relations with the functionary in question. A friend has, however, asserted 
that the word is of Scandinavian origin, and should be written bosun, adding 
that he had heard the term used in Norway. I have not chanced to fall in 
with the bird in Norway, not having been down on the coast until late in the 
season, and so cannot speak from personal knowledge, but my impression i^ 
that he is mistaken. — E d. 
