THE LONG-TAILED SKUA. 
401 
also, but some miles nearer to the entrance of the harbour, Mr. 
Hyndman, when dredging in the autumn of 1841, saw an adult 
male on wing; its extremely long tail-feathers satisfying him 
of its species. In the f Dublin Penny Journal' of March 9th, 
1833 (p. 292), a bird of an unknown kind was described and 
figured. Being in Dublin that month I went to see the speci- 
men, which was in the collection of Mr. Massey of the Pigeon- 
house Port, and found it to be an immature long- tailed skua. 
It was shot on the 9th of October, 1832, from the Pigeon-house 
wall, which runs far into the Bay of Dublin. 
Mr. J. Y. Stewart informed me in June 1845, that while 
sea -shooting at Ards in the north-west of Donegal in November 
1816 or 1817, four of these skuas, in company, flew over his head, 
and he killed one of them; — he had not seen the species since. 
He considered skuas generally as very rare there, and though 
yachting much at one period, had observed only two or three 
more of the genus := — they were all larger than the bird now 
under consideration. 
On the 20th of October, 1845, two of these long-tailed skuas 
were seen flying in a south-west direction above Belfast Bay. One 
was shot on the 1st of March, 1846, in a ploughed field near Tra- 
more (county Waterford), in which it was picking up objects from 
the ground. It came in rapid flight direct from the sea to the 
field. This bird is in the collection of Mr. Warren, Dublin. Its 
in. 
lin. 
Length (total), to end of two longest tail-feathers 
17 
0 
„ exclusive of two longest tail-feathers 
15 
6 
„ of wing . 
12 
3 
„ of bill above, without measuring curve . 
1 
0 
„ of bill to rictus, measured in a straight line 
1 
H 
„ of tarsus . . 
1 
7 
„ of middle toe and nail in a straight line . 
1 
4 
Transverse diameter of bill at front . ... 
0 
4! 
2 
Of the two longest tail-feathers ; the one passes others 
1 
0 
„ „ the second passes others . 
Breadth of the two longest tail-feathers where they pass the 
1 
6 
others . . • . 
0 
H 
This bird would have been adult at the following moult. 
vol. hi. 2 D 
