GLAUCOUS GULL. 
307 
every autumn and winter ; stray birds have with- 
in the last fifteen years been obtained at the same 
season, in several of the English counties, in Scot- 
land, and in Ireland. On the Continent it also 
occurs accidentally, and is recorded by the northern 
ornithologists. We possess a specimen killed in 
winter in the Firth of Forth, and for the last two 
winters a gull with white wings has occasionally 
travelled up and down the river Annan for fifteen 
miles, but has been so shy as to baffle all endea- 
vours to procure it. In Shetland, Mr. Edmondstone 
remarks, that when allured by carrion, it “ enters 
the bays and boldly ventures inland.” It is an 
Arctic bird, however, in its breeding habits, has 
been observed by nearly all the northern voyagers, 
and its habits described by several of them ; these 
are said to be extremely voracious, and one dis- 
gorged a little auk when struck by shot, a second 
being found in the stomach of the same bird on dis- 
section. It breeds on the projecting ledges of rocks, 
but Captain Scorseby found the egg3 on the coast of 
Spitzbergen, deposited in the same way as those of 
the tern, on the shingle above high-water mark. 
The specimen alluded to as killed in the Firth of 
Forth has the head, neck and under parts white, 
clouded with pale clove-brown, that colour on the 
crown and checks assuming the form of streaks; 
mantle and wings pearl grey, secondaries and sca- 
pulars with white tips, quills for two or three inches 
at the tips nearly pure white ; tail and upper covers 
white, the former clouded with clove-brown on the 
