GREAT BLACK-BACKED GULL. 299 
quills black, slightly greyish at the hase, the fourth 
and fifth black at the tips, with the point white ; 
bill carmine red ; feet and legs brownish red. 
Plate XXIII. exhibits the Larus melanocephalus, 
Boye; in this the head is black, and does not extend 
so far down the front of the neck ; the back of the 
neck, mantle and wings, very pale grey ; quills 
white at the tips, the outer web of the first black to 
within two inches of the tip ; the bill orange-red, 
with a dark band across the angle ; legs and feet 
brownish red. 
"We now have to describe the British series of 
True Gulls, placing one or two smaller species at 
the conclusion, as being more exclusively maritime, 
and in some points assimilating with the petrels 
with which we commenced the family. The True 
Gulls are mostly of large size, and are almost all 
distinguished by two colours, pure white covering 
the head, vent and under parts, and by a darker 
mantle and wings of some grey shade. One of the 
largest is 
The Great Black-Backed Gull, Larus mari- 
nus, Linn. — Goeland a manteau noir, Temm 
Black-backed or Great Black-backed Gull of British 
authors. — {L. ncevius, the Wagel , young ) — This fine 
species, the largest of our British gulls, is much less 
frequent than the next bird we shall describe, and 
for which we think it has been sometimes mistaken, 
