TORRES STRAIT TERN. 
Strait. It was breeding on Lizard Island in the beginning of May, and on 
Raine’s Island in June, when both eggs and young birds were procured ; in 
the latter locality I found it in three small parties upon a low ridge on one 
side of the island, depositing its single egg in a slight hollow scooped out 
of the ground in a bare smooth spot surrounded with herbage. This bird was 
so much more shy than the Sooty Tern and Noddy, that I was obliged to resort 
to the gun to procure specimens, as it would not allow me to approach 
sufficiently near to throw a short stick with effect.” 
Mr. Tom Carter says he only twice noted this species breeding, namely 
on Fraser Island, Point Cloates, North West Austraha, on April 26th, 1902: 
“ Each egg was laid singly in a slight depression in the sand, on one of the 
highest points of the island (about 25 feet above sea-level). There was no 
nesting-material, and the eggs (14 in number) were all within a radius of three 
feet. On March the 25th, 1893, my natives brought about 60 eggs from 
Fraser Island.” 
The bird described is a male, collected near Broome, North-west Australia, 
on October 22nd, 1903, by Mr. J. P. Rogers. 
Gould separated this form as larger than the one inhabiting the South- 
eastern coasts which he had named S. poUocerca, and figured both in his Birds 
of Australia. I have already given the extract where Colonel Legge, though 
inclined to lump all the forms of S. hergii, admitted that the Tasmanian bird 
certainly merited its subspecific name. 
On account of the common occurrence of forms of 8. hergii all round 
Australia, httle attention has been paid to them, and it is at present difficult 
to define the limits of the subspecies admitted. When fully adult specimens are 
measured I find that the New South Wales, Victorian, Tasmanian and South 
Austrahans all have a wing-measurement of under 350 mm. ; Torres Strait and 
North-west Australian specimens agree in having the wing longer, and also the 
beak more powerful as well as longer. From South-west Australia comes an 
unexpected form which will be fully treated in the next article. 
VOL. n. 
349 
