: .'ill*. \ ' ii -• a n a Ai \ i f 11».
2 PROCELL A RIID2E.
with a single external orifice, within which the division between the two nasal
openings is visible. Tarsi compressed, feet moderate ; three toes in front united
by membranes, hind toe rudimentary, with a conical claw. Wings rather long,
the first quill-featlier the longest in the wing.
T he family of the Petrels or T ubinares was in former
Editions associated with the Larid.ce, hut a better knowledge
of their structure—due mainly to the investigations of the
late Professor Garrod, and the late Mr. W. A. Forbes—has
proved that, from an anatomical point of view, the grounds
for such collocation are very slight. Whereas the Gulls
are scliizorliinal, the Petrels are liolorliinal; there are some
important myological distinctions ; the character of the caeca
is quite different; moreover the eggs of the Petrels are white,
and their young are helpless : in which, and in several other
points, the Petrels approach the Storks, the American Vultures,
and some of the Steganopodes. The Editor is, however,
reluctant to change the previous arrangement more than is
absolutely necessary, and he, therefore, retains the Petrels in
their former position next to the Gulls, although the two
families have little in common beyond their webbed feet and
more or less pelagic habits.*
T he F ulmar P etrel is chiefly an autumn and winter
visitor to the more southern parts of England, and even then
the specimens obtained are chiefly birds which have been
driven to our coasts by tempestuous weather. Under such
circumstances they have been known to occur far inland, and
as they are incapable of rising from a flat surface, examples
have been captured alive. But although rare, even on the
east coast from Northumberland to Essex, they are by no
means uncommon at times on the fishing-grounds about
thirty miles out, and when the herring-nets are being hauled
the voracity of the Fulmars is so great that they are sometimes
taken by hand. Stragglers have also been obtained
along the south and west coasts as far as Devon, Cornwall,
v The late Professor Garrod proposed to divide the Tubinares into two groups,
the Procellariidce and the Occanitidce, and these opinions are confirmed by
Mr. Forbes, whose views are fully stated in his ‘Report on the Voyage of
H.M.S. Challenger,’ Zoology, Vol. IV. Pt. xi. ; see especially pp. 54-64.
and Somerset, and sometimes, though not often, off Wales
and the north-western counties.
To Ireland the Fulmar is considered to he a still rarer
visitor, and Thompson only records three examples, namely,
one at Inchidoney Island, one near Dublin, and one near
Cork; but possibly this may be owing to the absence of
observers, for Mr. R. Warren has obtained, or found dead,
no less than eight examples, on the sands at the Estuary of
the Moy. His attention was attracted to two of these by the
attempts of a Great Black-backed Gull to kill and devour
them in their water-logged and enfeebled condition after
heavy weather.
On the eastern shores of Scotland, according to Mr. R.
Gray, this species occurs in winter, being frequently cast up
by the sea or obtained in an emaciated condition. Its breeding
quarters are St. Kilda, Soa, and Borrera, from which
group of rocks it is a straggler in the summer season to the
Outer Hebrides ; and it has been erroneously stated to nest
in Skye. In the Shetlands the Fulmar was only known as
a visitor until the 4th of June, 1878, when about a dozen
pairs were observed hovering round the cliffs of the island
of Foula, where they reared their young in some places in
which, according to the natives, no birds had ever bred before.
The nests were placed on small ledges formed by the splitting
of the rocks into layers, while the entire cliff seemed so perpendicular
that no foothold could be got for even the smallest
bird. The next year about double the number of birds returned
to the same quarters on Foula, and the species seem
to be increasing there (Zool. 1879, p. 380).
The following account was given in the Edinburgh
New Philosophical Journal by Mr. John Macgillivray, who
visited St. Kilda in June, 1840 “ This bird exists here in
almost incredible numbers, and to the natives is by far the
most important of the productions of the island. It forms
one of the principal means of support to the inhabitants,
who daily risk their lives in its pursuit. The Fulmar breeds
on the face of the highest precipices, and only on such as
are furnished with small grassy shelves, every spot on which,