STERNA BERG II. 
1029 
Butler, 83rd Regt., visited this place in May 1877, and found the Terns breeding in groups, making no nest, 
not even scratching a nest-hole. “ The eggs/’ he writes, “ are laid on the bare ground, in the most open and 
exposed parts of the island, about 1 foot apart ; and when sitting the birds seem packed together as close as 
possible without perhaps actually touching each other.” So close are the eggs laid to one another that a lot of 
47, belonging to a large group of birds, did not occupy more than 6 or 8 square feet. On retiring a little 
distance, after frightening the Terns from the nests, hundreds of Sooty Gulls mixed with them, and descending 
with the owners of the eggs, fought with them, carrying off the eggs as fast as possible and devouring them. 
I have been favoured by my friend Mr. Howard Saunders with a view of a large series of the eggs taken 
by Captain Butler on this occasion. They are exceedingly variable, the ground-colour being pale reddish 
grey, dark salmon-colour, pale stone-grey, pale reddish white, and light greyish. They are of the usual shape, 
rather more pointed than those of many other species. Some are marked with boid hieroglyphic stieaks, and 
others with rounded blotches of deep red-brown ; others with huge blots or clouds of blackish sepia, some, 
again, with long bold straggly lines of the same, mixed with rather fine irregular streaks of olive-brown. The 
bold markings are, for the most part, at the large end, with a few scattered over the surface at the small end ; 
the underlying coloration consists of clouds and spots of pale reddish or bluish grey ; but some eggs are almost 
devoid of the latter. The dimensions of several are 2 - 37 by 172, 2'3 by T73, 2 '45 by 1*67 inches. They are 
rather rough in texture. Eggs from the Red Sea do not differ from the above : two specimens in Mr. Dresser's 
collection are pointed ovals, of a rather chalky texture and stone-white ground-colour, marked throughout 
with blots of rich dark brown over large blotches and clouds of dark inky grey; they measure 2T7 by T52 
and 2-21 by l - 53 inches. Another is of a buff-grey ground-colour, closely marked with large clouds of umber 
and olive-brown, taking a longitudinal direction, and under which there are smaller markings of dusky bluish 
grey ; it measures 2'23 by 1'5 inches. 
