244 
British Birds. 
this country, the individual in question may have been an escaped bird. The 
Trumpeter Swan belongs to the section of the genus Cygnus which has no knob 
on the base of the bill, and the trachea enters the hollow keel of the sternum. There 
is no yellow at the base of the bill, which is large and has the culmen nearly four 
inches in length. 
The bird belongs to a purely Antarctic genus, and it must have escaped from con- 
finement, though the condition of its plumage did not indicate that it had been 
recently kept in captivity. The species is pure white in plumage, with a yellow bill, 
ornamented with the curious ‘ sheath ’ at the base of the mandible, whence the 
Sheath-bills take their name. 
Page 192. Add : — • 
THE ANTARCTIC 
SHEATHBILL. 
[Chionis alba.) 
A specimen of this curious species was killed at Car- 
lingford Lighthouse, in Co. Down, in December, 1892. 
It was exhibited at a meeting of the Zoological Society on 
the 28th of February, 1893, by Mr. R. M. Barrington. 
Finis. 
