PHAETHON FLAYIROSTRIS. 
1175 
likewise found in the West Indies. In the Pacific it is widely distributed among the islands of Polynesia. 
Layard records it from Fiji, and it is included in M. Marie’s list of New-Caledonian birds. It has recently 
been procured by a German naturalist, Mr. Hiibner, in the island of Eua, whence also Layard obtained its 
egg. It has also been procured of late in the islands of Ponape and Niwafou ; Canon Tristram has specimens 
from the Samoa group; and Messrs. Hartlaub and Finsch speak of it from the Pelew Islands (where it breeds), 
from the Stewart group, and likewise from Ualan, one of the eastern Caroline islands. 
Habits . — The Tropic-birds are well-known attendants on vessels while passing through warm latitudes, as 
their inquisitiveness causes them, particularly at nights, to hover about the mast-heads; sometimes they will 
fly round the vane and now and then peck at it, and on still moonlight nights, in the Indian Ocean, I have 
seen them sitting on it for half an hour together. The present species does not differ in its nature from 
its larger and better-known relative, the Red-tailed Tropic-bird ; and some of the individuals which I saw 
about the ship at night during a recent voyage down the Indian Ocean most probably belonged to it. These 
birds are fearless, and will approach close to a vessel in the daytime. They dwell much on the open ocean, 
and are possessed of great powers of flight. They usually fly with the bills pointed downwards, often hovering 
for a while, and plunge rapidly on their prey like a Tern, not immersing more than the head and neck in the 
water; their plump form and lengthened pointed tails give them a graceful appearance on the wing, and the 
motion of their wings, which is rapid and regular, adds to the attractiveness of their appearance. Notwith- 
standing, however, that “ Bo’sun ” birds are found so much at sea, numbers are resident about the islands 
where they breed, and there subsist largely on crabs ; at sea they are often to be seen dropping on flying- fish, 
and probably pick up various floating matter, as do Petrels. The name of “ Boatswain-bird ” is applied by 
sailors to these birds on account of a fancied resemblance in the tail to a marling-spike, which is one of the 
most important of a boatswain’s stores. 
The Boatswain-bird walks with difficulty. Jones, in his account of the natural history of Bermuda, says 
it “ rests its breast on the ground, and shuffles along in an awkward manner, spreading its wings partially.” 
Nidification . — The nearest nesting-place of this species to Ceylon is probably to he found in the Seychelles 
.■■roup. Here Mr. E. Newton found a nest on Mahe in January; it was situated in a hole in the dead stump 
of a “ capucin,” about 15 feet from the ground, and contained a young bird, the produce of the single egg 
which these species always lay. At Ascension Mr. Gill, as recorded by Mr. Penrose (loc. cit.), found it breeding 
on “ Boatswain-bird Island,” so called from the large numbers of Tropic-birds which always nest there. It 
was scarcer than the larger barred species, P. cethereus, and was nesting in holes on the side of the island. Like 
its congeners it is very tame when breeding, allowing itself to be pulled out of its nest, but biting vigoiouslv 
notwithstanding. An egg which Canon Tristram has kindly lent me for examination has a reddish-white 
"round-colour, hut is so much obscured by the brownish-red stipplings with which the whole egg is covered 
that it is scarcely visible ; round the middle of the egg the speckling is somewhat coarser than at the ends ; 
but at the small end the specks have the appearance of having run into one another, and this part is best 
described by saying it has a sedimentary look. In shape it is a stumpy oval, much broader at one end than 
the other, though neither are pointed, but, on the contrary, rather flattened. Its dimensions are— length 2*08, 
breadth 1*52 inches. . . 
Canon Tristram kindly sends me the following interesting account, which I give here verbatim, of the 
nesting of this species at Bermuda “ After a lapse of thirty-four years, Capt. Legge invites me to write my 
recollections of the breeding of Phaeton flavirostris in Bermuda. Premising that I have only the stores of 
memory, not of note-hooks, to which to refer, I cannot give exact dates of days of month &c., which, however, 
have, I believe, been supplied by my friend Mr. Jones, in the i Naturalist in Bermuda.’ All through the winter 
months and the early spring not a Tropic- bird is ever seen round the islands. They muster, on a sudden, 
towards the end of April ; and then for three months they are the ornithological feature of the still vexed 
Bermoothes. Their arrival is not a silent one. Noisy as Swifts they dash and sweep and sail round cliffs and 
headlands with their wondrouslv graceful flight. In a few days they seem to have decided on their respective 
ledo es, much after the fashion of Rooks in an English park. Each pair select a little ledge with a hole in the 
soft limestone' cliff, if they can find one; if not, they content themselves with a shallow scooped niche, always. 
