I 2 6 
General Notes. 
follows closely in their wake. When the catch has been a large one, and 
the work of cleaning the fish is continued at the anchorage, they remain 
about the spot for hours picking up this offal directly under the sides of 
the vessels. Here again the poor birds are often mercilessly slaughtered 
by city gunners who shoot them for sport or practice, leaving the dead 
and wounded to float out to sea with the ebbing tide. The fishermen 
admit that their numbers have greatly diminished of late years, but they 
are said to be still very abundant through the winter months. — William 
Brewster, Cambridge , Mass. 
Sterna forsteri breeding off the Eastern Shore of Virginia. 
— An impression seems to prevail among ornithologists that Forster’s 
Tern breeds only in the interior of North America. At least I cannot 
learn that Dr. Coues’ comparatively recent ruling* to that effect has 
been publicly corrected, or that it is generally known that the bird nests 
on the Atlantic Coast. f On this account it may be worth while to 
state that during a visit to Cobb’s Island, Va., in July, 1880 , 1 found Forster’s 
Terns breeding in moderate numbers on all the neighboring islands. 
They nested apart from the other Terns, but often in company with 
Laughing Gulls, on the salt marshes or on marshy islets, where their 
eggs were almost invariably laid on tide-rows of drift-weed that fringed 
the muddy shores. The largest colony seen in any one place comprised 
perhaps twenty-five pairs, but it was more usual to find from six to a 
dozen mingled with a countless number of Gulls. I was late for the eggs, 
but secured a few far advanced in incubation, besides several downy young 
and many adult birds in full nuptial dress. — William Brewster, Cam- 
bridge, Mass. 
Note on the Foot of Accipiter fuscus. —On the plantar surfaces 
of each foot of the Sharp-shinned Hawk two papillae may be noticed, 
which differ from the others, more properly described as pads, in their 
greater length and more symmetrical form. These pads are placed at 
the second phalangeal joint of the third toe, and at the third phalangeal 
joint of the fourth toe, that is, at the bases of the penultimate phalanges 
of the third and fourth toes. These papillae are shown to be modified 
pads, the same as those at the other two joints,’ by the less developed 
papillae of Circus , Astur , and others. This transition can readily be 
traced in the sketches of the feet given in the systematic works on Hawks, 
though the special prominence of the papillae in the Sharp-shinned Hawk 
does not seem to be particularly noted. On removing the skin, however, 
a marked difference at once comes in view. While all the pads are nearly 
obliterated, the papillae still remain as solid cones of connective tissue (?), 
having much the same shape and sizes as the entire papillae. These cones 
* Birds of the Northwest, 1874, pp. 679, 680. 
t Mr. Sennett and Dr. Merrill found it breeding on the Lower Rio Grande in Texas. 
(Sennett, B. Rio Grande, 1878, pp. 65, 66 ; Merrill, Ornith. Southern Texas, 1878, p. 172.) 
