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Show 290 MR. J. J. LISTER ON THE [Apr. 21, LARID^S. STERNA FULIGINOSA (Gmel.). STERNA LTJNATA (Peale l). These two species had precisely similar habits. There were thousands of them on the island going about in large flocks, now settled on the ground and now rising with shrill and deafening cries. The flocks were not mixed, each being formed of a single species. The eggs are laid on the bare patches of coral shingle, the two species occupying separate areas. Though I came on several of these patches and collected numbers of the eggs, I never found two eggs together, as though laid by one bird. The habits of the Sooty Tern (Sterna fuliginosa), with regard to the number of eggs it incubates at one time, appear to vary. Pickering states that among the hundreds of eggs he saw at Rosa Island, he saw two eggs together only in two cases 2. Similarly at ' Wideawake Fair' on Ascension the bird is described as laying only a single egg3. On the other hand, H u m e found the eggs "two and three together " at the Laccadive Islands 4, and Audubon states that the bird lays three eggs B in his description of their nesting-haunts in the Tortugas Keys. Both Arundel and Hague (op. cit.) say that the " Wideawakes," under which term either or both of these species may be included, have two laying-seasons in the year at these islands. Sterna fuliginosa is found all round the world in the tropics, occasionally visiting our own shores. Sterna lunata, which was first obtained by the Wilkes Expedition at various tropical islands of the Pacific, ranges also into the Indian Ocean. The egg of Sterna lunata resembles that of S. fuliginosa iu colour, but it is smaller and rounder. My largest specimen is 1*68 in. long and 1*26 broad, the smallest is 155 in. long and 1 2 broad. The egg is creamy white, profusely and uniformly sprinkled with overlying spots of rich brown and deeper ones of pale purple. ANOUS STOLIDTJS (Linn.). These were present in hundreds, going about in large flocks. They have a habit of settling packed together as close as thev can stand. I found no eggs, but we came on half-fledged young birds under the tangled branches of the Sida. The bird is distributed through all the tropical seas. ANOUS CCERULEUS (Bennett0). This exquisite little bird is of a delicate silvery-grey colour and the most elegant proportions. They follow one about in parties 1 Peale, Zoology U. S. Expl. Exped. 1848, p. 277. 2 Cagsin, U. S. Expl. Exped., Zool. p. 388. 3 Sperling, ' Ibis,' 1868, p. 287. Penrose, Ibis, 1879, p. 278. 4 Hume, ' Stray Feathers,' 1876, p. 430. " Audubon, 'Ornithological Biography,' vol. iii. p. 266. 6 Narrative of a Whaling Voyage round the Globe, ii. p. 298 (1840). |