Read December 15, 1818.
I received in the last summer, by one of the whaling ships from Davis's Straits, a collection of birds, which had been made by my brother Captain Edward Sabine of the Royal Artillery, who accompanied the late expedition in search of a North-West passage. Among them were specimens of a Gull hitherto unknown and undescribed.
My brother's account of them was as follows: They were met with by him and killed on the 25th of July last on a group of three low rocky islands, each about a mile across, on the west coast of Greenland, twenty miles distant from the main land, in latitude 75° 29′ N., and longitude 60° 9′ W. They were associated in considerable numbers with the Sterna Hirundo, breeding on those islands, the nests of both birds being intermingled.
The male and female are nearly the same size, the latter is rather the smallest, but their plumage is exactly similar. The length of different specimens varies from twelve and a half to fourteen inches; the extent of the wings is about thirty-three inches, and the weight from six and a half to seven and a half ounces. The following is a full description. The bill one inch long, the base of both mandibles black as far as the angular projection of the lower mandible, the remainder yellow; the inside
