II2 
allen’s naturalist’s library. 
pi. 620 (1880); B. O. U. List Brit. B. p. 206 (1883); 
Saunders, ed. Yarrell’s Brit. B. iv. p. 61 (1884); See- 
bohm, Hist. Brit. B. iii. p. 371 (1885); Saunders, Man. 
Brit. B. p. 681 (1889); Lilford, Col. Fig. Brit. B. part xviii. 
(1891). 
{Plate CV.) 
Adult in Summer Plumage. — General colour above glossy black ; 
wings like the back; quills brownish black, the secondaries 
tipped with white, forming a white bar; tail also black; head 
and neck glossy black, like the back ; the throat rather more 
brownish black ; under surface white, sharply defined from the 
black of the hack, ascending on to the throat and forming a 
triangular patch ; sides of body dove-grey ; a large white patch 
on each side of the head in front of the eye. Total length, 
25-0 inches; culmen, 3-6 ; wing, 6'o ; tail, 3-8; tarsus, I'S. 
Winter Plumage.— As in the Razor-bill, the throat is white in 
winter. 
Range in Great Britain. — The Great Auk used to breed in 
S. Kilda, but even by the middle of the last century the birds 
had become very irregular in their visits.* A male and 
female were killed at Papa Westray, one of the Orkneys, in 
1812. The male bird of this pair is nowin the British Museum. 
In August of 1821 or 1822, Fleming records a specimen sent 
to him from S. Kilda, and, according to the researches of 
Mr. Henry Evans, a bird of this species w'as captured in the 
same group of islands about the year 1840. That the Great 
Auk formerly had a more extended range in ancient times 
has been proved by the remains ivhich hav’e been found in 
Caithness and Argyll, and even as far south as some old sea- 
caves in Durham (cf Saunders, Man. p. 682). Mr. Barrett- 
Hamilton has collected the evidence of the existence of 
Plautus impennis in Ireland, where Mr. W. J. Knowles has 
found remains of the species on the coast of Antrim, along 
with those of the hor.se, dog, or wolf, “in conjunction with 
human remains believed to be those of the earliest Neolithic 
* For an epitome of the range and habits of the Great Auk, I am 
indebted to a pamphlet written by Mr. Thomas Parkin, and to Mr. 
Howard Saunders’ “ ilanual.” 
