The Scottish Naturalist. - 231 



have been encountered on the broad Atlantic hundreds of miles 

 away from any shore. Mr Gray says ^ that, some years ago, his 

 friend, Mr Dewar, when sailing from America to this country, 

 observed great numbers of American White-winged Cross-bills 

 crossing the Atlantic before a stiff westerly breeze, and many of 

 the flocks alighted on the rigging and deck of the steamer, 

 which at the time was about 600 miles east of the Newfound- 

 land coast ; and the late Mr Thompson, in his ' Birds of Ire- 

 land,' has recorded one case, in which from fifty to sixty Snowy 

 Owls "were seen 500 miles from land on their way across ; and Mr 

 Cavendish Taylor, when on a voyage across the North Atlantic 

 during the month of July, and about 350 miles from the coast of 

 Ireland, saw a pair of Curlews (species not stated) which passed 

 the ship, bound to the eastward. When first noticed they were 

 at some distance, but were distinctly seen through a glass : they 

 then flew near the ship, as if to reconnoitre, and went rapidly 

 a-head, flying just above the surface of the water.^ Who can say 

 whence these birds came? It is not likely that a strong-winged 

 bird like the Curlew had been blown off any shore, and that they 

 were now returning to land, or that they had been induced to 

 follow any ship, which occasionally migrants do, when coasting 

 from headland to headland, or island to island, and are thus in- 

 veigled out to long distances from land, and by keeping with the 

 ship eventually cross the ocean. A seeming instance of this once 

 came under my own observation, when, in the month of Novem- 

 ber, on passing through the Azores, and at some little distance to 

 the south and westward of Fayal and Pico, but still in sight of 

 land, a Skylark and a Starling came off to the ship. The former 

 left us either the next morning or the following, veering off to the 

 south-east in the direction of Madeira ; the Starling, however, re- 

 mained about the ship till within two days' sail of the Bermudas, 

 when, as if actuated by some sudden impulse, it darted off in a 

 southerly direction, which, if pursued, would have landed him on 

 some of the West India Islands ; but whether the poor bird ever 

 fell in with another ship or reached the land in safety, it is impos- 

 sible to say. I only mention this to show that this is one way in 

 which birds may be encountered in mid-ocean. A curious case 

 of this sort is recorded by Mr C. E. Smith, on the authority of 

 Captain Gravil, of the whaler Diana -.^ "During one of the re- 



1 'Birds of W. Scotland,' p. 156. 



^ ' Ibis,' 1869, p. 390. 



^ ' Zoologist,' 1866, p. 455. 



