GREAT SHEARWATER.
PUFFINtlS MAJOR, Faber.
Puffinus major, Faber, Prodr. isl. Orn. p. 56 (1822).
Puffinus cinereus, Macg. v. p. 438.
Puffinus major, Hewitson, ii. p. 516; Yarr. ed. 4, iv. p. 1 2;
Dresser, viii. p. 527.
Petrel puffin, French.
This Shearwater appears irregularly, occasionally in
large numbers, on our southern and western coasts.
I had the good fortune, in company with Mr. W.
Vingoe, of Penzance, to find a very fine fresh specimen
dead on the beach near Marazion, in the summer of
1852, and this year (1888) purchased the specimen from
which the drawing for the Plate was taken, of that well-known
and excellent taxidermist, recently deceased.
This specimen was killed some years ago in Mount's
Bay.
It is impossible to distinguish this species on the
wing from the large Shearwater of the Mediterranean
(P. kuhli), but one or the other species is frequent at all
seasons in the Bay of Biscay and off the west coast of
Spain and Portugal.
The fishermen in Scilly assured me that a pair or two
of " llagbolts," as they call this bird, bred amongst the
rocks of one of the south-western islets of the group,
and I saw several during my stay at St. Mary's in
1852.