AUSTRALIAN SKUA. 
three interesting variations in the course of its range, which I have been enabled to trace 
by the aid of a fine series in the British Museum. From Campbell’s Island in 54° S. 168° E. 
up to Norfolk Island, in 29° S. (its most northern known range), past Kerguelen’s Island, 
the Crozets, and up to the Cape of Good Hope, where Layard observed it in April, the 
specimens all agree in their remarkable uniformity of sooty-brown plumage, there being few, 
if any, striations even upon the feathers of the neck. wEilst the size of some of the examples 
is enormous, the primaries measuring 16 and 17 inches from carpal joint to tips of primaries. 
The Falkland Island Skuas, locally known as “ Cape Egmont Hens ” and “ Sea Hens,” 
are decidedly smaller, and the acuminate feathers of the neck and shoulders are distinctly 
streaked wdth yellowish- white, although the general sooty appearance is preserved. 
On the coasts of Chili or Peru, its place is taken by a bird which I consider fully 
entitled to specific rank, and wEich, strange to say, has all its affinities with the Northern 
Skua. 
The affinities of this well-defined form are decidedly with 8. catarrhactes and not with 
8. antarcticus ; it is, indeed, a somewhat slighter bird than the former, and remarkable 
for its rich cinnamon-coloured under-parts, wing-coverts and axillaries. 
and noted as well that three specimens obtained by the “ Erebus ” and 
“ Terror ” on the pack-ice differed considerably, as if they lived under 
Antarctic conditions. 
Twenty years afterward, when he monographed the Larifor7nes in the 
Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., Vol. XXV., he named this last-mentioned form, 
8. lYiaccor^nicki— hut did not divide the Falkland Islands, Kerguelen, and New 
Zealand breeding Great Skuas. He has been generally followed without 
investigation by English-speaking authors, so that it was not Until Lonnberg 
wrote up the birds of the Swedish South Polar Expedition that the New 
Zealand and Falkland Islands forms were recognised as worthy of separate 
names. Lonnberg however named the Falkland Islands bird, leaving the 
New Zealand and Kerguelen ones to bear the name of 8. antarcticus ; 
but upon looking up the type-locality of Lesson’s 8. antarcticus I was 
enabled to rectify Lonnberg’s error, and therefore named the New Zealand 
bird in honour of him for having indicated the confusion by his action. 
Lesson’s description {Traite d^Orn., p. 616, 1831) reads: — 
Lestris antarcticus. Lestris cataractes Quoy et Gaim. Uran., pi. 38. Bee et tarses 
noirs ; queue courte, cuneiforme ; plumage brim fuligineux, zone en devant de cercles 
gris-blanc : un miroir blanc sur les remiges. Des lies Malouines ; de la Nouvelle-Zelande. 
There is not much in this description, but the “ zone en devant de 
cercles gris-blanc ” does not apply to the New Zealand bird. The figure 
quoted is that of a Falkland Islands bird and the first-named locality is 
“ iles Malouines ” : consequently the type-locality of Lesson’s L. antarcticus 
must be accepted as Falkland Islands. 
In the Consp. Gen. Av., Vol. II., p. 207, 1857, Bonaparte included : — 
Stercorarius antarcticus Mus. Paris a Gaimardo ex Mar. Antarct, Austral, Ins. 
Campbell, Terra Kerguelen! . 
Major : Rostro brevi, crasso. 
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