PROCELLARIA COOKII, g . r . Gray.
Cook’s Petrel.
Procellaria Cooidi, G. R. Gray in Dìeffenbach’s Tray, in New Zealand, vol. ii. p. 199.— L ist o f B irds in B rit. Mus.
Coll., P a rt I I I . p. 165.
--------------velox, Sol. MSS. Banks’s Icon, inedit. t. 16?
------------- leucoptera, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., P a rt X II. p. 57 ; Ann. and Mag. of N at. Hist., vol. xiii. p . 364.
I h a v e been informed that this species breeds in abundance on one of the small islands near the mouth of
the harbour o f Port Stephen, in New South Wales, where my specimens were procured. I frequently saw
it during my passage from Sydney to Cape Horn, but it was most numerous between the coast o f Australia
and the northern part of New Zealand.. For a true Petrel it is one of the most elegantly formed species of
the genus, and is rendered conspicuously different from the rest of its congeners by its white abdomen and
under wing-coverts, which show very conspicuously when the bird is on the wing, particularly when seen
from beneath, as it frequently may be when the breeze is fresh or a gale rising; it seldom, however, even
then mounts higher than the vane of the vessel.
From the number of species figured in the present work, it will be seen that the Australian seas abound
with Petrels, the investigation of the various species o f which, their habits and economy, as well as their
places o f abode, will serve to occupy the attention o f ornithologists for years to come. It could scarcely be
expected that a single voyage to Australia could add much to our knowledge of the subject; my readers
must therefore be contented in this instance with little more than an illustration. That, like the other
members of the genus, it subsists upon small fishes, medusae, and others of the lower marine animals, there
can be no doubt.
The sexes do not differ in external appearance.
Crown o f the head, all the upper surface and wings dark slaty black; tail slate-grey; greater wing-
coverts slightly fringed with white ; face, throat, all the under surface, the base o f the inner webs o f the
primaries and secondaries, and a line along the inner edge of the shoulder pure white ; bill black; tarsus
and basal half o f the interdigital membrane fleshy white; remainder of the toes and interdigital membrane
black.
The Plate represents a male and a female of the size of life.