34 
alLen’s naturalist’s library. 
number consumed daily in June was fifty ; and supposing tbe 
Convicts (twenty in number) to have consumed as many, 3,000 
young birds must have been killed in one month ; yet I could 
observe no sensible diminution in the number of young, a 
circumstance which will give the reader some idea of the vast 
number of birds of this species congregated on a mere vegetated 
sand-bank like Raine’s Islet.” 
A similar gathering of these Terns during the nesting-season 
has been described and figured by the Hon. Walter Rothschild 
in his “Avifauna of Laysan.” 
Neat. — None, the egg being deposited in the sand or among 
the fissures of the volcanic debris of an island such as 
Ascension. 
Egg.— One only. Compared with the eggs of S. anmsihetd, 
the markings, though very similar in character, are, as a rule, 
bolder, and the ground-colour approaches in some specimens 
to a purplish-buff. Axis, i-95-2’i5 inches; diam., i' 35 -i'SS- 
VII. THE LITTLE TERN. STERNA MINUTA. 
Sterna minula, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 228 (1766); Macgill. 
Brit. B. V. p. 652 (1852); Dresser, B. Eiir. viii. p. 279, 
pi. 582 (1876); B. O. U. List Brit. B. p. 181 (1883); 
Saunders, ed. Yarrell’s Brit. B. iii. p. 558 (1884); Seebohm, 
Hist. Brit. B. iii. p. 289 (1885) ; Saunders, Man. Brit. B. 
p. 635 (18S9); Lilford, Col. Fig. Brit. B. part xxix. (1S94); 
Saunders, Cat. B. Brit. Mus. x.xv. p. 116 (1896). 
Adult Male. — General colour above pearly-grey, the wing- 
coverts like the back ; lower rump and upper tail-coverts 
white ; bastard-wing pearly-grey, but the primary-coverts 
blackish like the jirimaries, tlie first three of which are blackish 
along the outer web and also along the inner side of the shaft 
for the whole length of the quill, broadening on the second 
and third primary, all three of them having the rest of the 
inner w-eb w-hite ; remainder of the primaries pearly-grey, a 
little darker than the back, and with white margins to the inner- 
most ; secondaries mostly white, the outer web and the shaft 
dusky-grey; the innermost secondaries pearly-grey like the 
