Page:The birds of America, volume 7.djvu/156

114 Tern, and wherever a shoal of small fish was found, there they would hover and dash headlong at them for several minutes at a time.

The wreckers informed me that this species returns regularly to these islands each spring, about the 10th of April, and goes off southward early in September. These birds, with their favourite companions the Sandwich Terns, habitually resorted to the sand-bars each day, to rest for an hour or two. I have never seen them on any part of our middle or eastern coast, and am of opinion that they rarely proceed farther eastward than the Capes of Florida, and that they are more attached to the immediate vicinity of the shores than the larger species, which more generally fly out to some distance. The delicate and beautiful rosy tint of the breast soon fades after death. Those specimens which were not skinned immediately after being procured did not retain it for a week, and in none of them was it perceptible, without separating the feathers, at the end of a month. In winter it disappears, as well as the glossy black of the head. The length of the outer tail-feathers varies considerably; but I could perceive no decided difference of size or colour in the sexes, although I thought the females somewhat smaller than the males.

Sterna Dodgallii, Mont. Temm.

Roseate Tern, Nutt. Man., vol. ii. p. 278.

Roseate Tern, Sterna Dougallii, Aud. Orn. Biog., vol. iii. p. 296. Male, 14||, 30. Florida Keys, where it is abundant, and breeds. Migratory. Adult Male.

Bill longer than the head, slender, tapering, compressed, nearly straight, very acute. Upper mandible with the dorsal line slightly arched, the ridge rather broad and convex at the base, narrow towards the end, the sides convex, the edges sharp and inflected, the tip acute. Nasal groove short, extended to one-third of the length of the bill, deflected towards the edge; nostrils basal, linear, direct, pervious. Lower mandible with the angle extremely narrow, very acute, extending to a little beyond the middle, the dorsal line straight, the sides convex, the sharp edges inflected, the tip extremely acute.

Head of moderate size, oblong; neck of moderate length; body very slender; feet small; wings and tail very long. Tibia bare for a considerable space; tarsus very short, slender, roundish, covered anteriorly with small scutella, laterally and behind with reticular scales; toes small, slender, the first very small, the third longest, the fourth nearly as long, the second much shorter, all scutellate above, the anterior united by reticulated webs having a