THE BLACK TERN. 
305 
served specimen which had been killed in Belfast Bay some years 
before that time. Another, respecting which no precise date can 
be given, was subsequently observed there at the indentation of 
the coast, called Adams* Bay. One shot either on the quay or 
Long Bridge of Belfast, on the 28th October, 1831, came under 
my examination : it was a young bird of the year, as was another 
that I saw, which had been killed about the river Lagan at 
Lisburn, on the 4th or 5th of the same month. 
A bird of this species is stated to have been obtained at Water- 
ford in the year 1831.* In the middle of May, 1835, a tern, 
shot at Clontarf, Dublin Bay (where three more were seen 
at the same time), came under the notice of a friend, who de- 
scribed it to me as “of a slate-colour, darkening to the head, 
which is black, as are the bill and feet : it is 1 0 inches long, and 
23 inches in expanse of wings.**! This is the description of an 
adult bird. A tern, described as “ black,** was once observed 
near Bonmahon, county of Waterford. In the possession of Mr. 
H. H. Dombrain, I have seen a specimen of the Sterna nigra that 
was shot from a boat in which this gentleman was, at the mouth of 
the Lrffey, on September 2nd, 1837; another was obtained at the 
same time. (Its length to centre of tail is inches ; wing from 
carpus 7 inches 1 1 lines ; bill above 1 inch ; tarsus 7 lines ; middle 
toe and nail measured in a straight line 1 Onlines; tail forked 
for 7 lines ; forehead white, occiput and nape black ; bill black ; 
legs and feet dusky.) One of these birds was shot in the autumn 
of 1841 at Bingsend, Dublin Bay.} Mr. B. Chute procured for 
his collection a black tern in full adult plumage, which was killed 
when flying over a small lake in Kerry in the summer of 1841 (?); 
and about the 1st of September, 1844, he shot an immature bird 
as it was on wing above the lake at Castlegregory, in the same 
county. A young bird, obtained at Lusk, county of Dublin, on 
the 21st of September, 1846, has come under my inspection in 
Mr. Watters* collection; in which there are two other immature 
birds obtained near Dublin, and an adult, shot in the summer of 
1847, inland, in the county of Kerry. 
* Dr. Burkitt. f Mr. R. Ball. } Mr. T. W. Warren, Nov. 184L 
VOL. III. 
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