GUXIyS AND TKRNS OF NEW KNGUND. 185 
a great beauty, and comes to us in a season when one has 
the most leisure and inclination for enjoying his visit. 
The last class of gulls may be disposed of in a word. It 
is made up of the huge Burgomaster {Lams glaucus ), the 
Iceland Gull (Larus leucoptcrus ), and Kumlien’s Gull 
{Larus kumlieni ). All are birds of the far north, arrayed 
entirely in white and gray, in tone with their surround¬ 
ings of snow and ice. They are occasional visitors along 
the New England shores in winter. 
THE TERNS. 
Terns, like gulls, are distributed over the greater part of 
the globe, though not showing the same fondness for high 
latitudes. They have wide domains, a single species often 
including several oceans and continents in its range. In 
plumage nearly all our terns are very similar, though dif¬ 
fering in size ; all have black crowns, pearl-gray wings, 
with or without black markings on their primaries, and 
white or gray underparts. The Black tern belongs to a 
different genus, and differs in plumage, as I shall explain 
later. 
There are only four species that require much attention, 
for no others breed in New England, though several other 
species appear as rare migrants or accidental stragglers. 
Wilson’s, or the Common Tern (Sterna hirundo ), used 
to be abundant on every shore and in every bay. Sea 
swallows they are called, and are among the favorite birds 
of all who have made their acquaintance. So popular and 
beautiful are they, that most of them have been induced 
to change their habitat, and now pose calmly on ladies’ 
head gear, in attitudes that must make their poor ghosts 
dizzy when they happen to run across their late earthly 
abodes. They reach our coast in May, and soon congre¬ 
gate at the home of their forefathers, on some island or 
rocky shore, and prepare for housekeeping. In August 
and September old and young gather in large flocks for 
social and educational purposes, and, soon after, the south- 
