The Scottish Naturalist. 239 



it must have had to cross from 600 to 700 miles of ocean before 

 reaching the Bermudas, — and this is not unUkely, the Corn-crake 

 seeming to be a great wanderer, having been found both in 

 Greenland and in the United States. The bird in question, 

 being in the plumage of the year, might have been bred in the 

 latter place ; still, the fact of its being found in Bermuda would 

 not be the less extraordinary. But perhaps as remarkable a sea 

 voyage as any for this weak-winged looking bird to have made, 

 is that to the Azores ; two examples having been got there, as 

 Mr Godman informs us, in his notes on the birds of those 

 Islands (' Ibis,' 1866, p. 102), the stuffed skins of which he had 

 himself seen. 



Another British bird is the Wheatear, which has been seen on 

 two occasions in Bermuda, if not oftener, — once by myself (' Ber. 

 Nat.,' p. 28) ; and several examples of this bird have since been 

 noticed on the American continent, as well as two instances of 

 the European Woodcock [Scolopax rusticola)', and the whole of 

 these probably found their way by Greenland. That birds, when 

 driven by adverse gales far out of their migratory course, seem to 

 lose all desire of migration, and become sedentary, I can well 

 understand ; but this I take to be the exception, not the rule, as 

 very much would depend on circumstances, whether the spot 

 to which they were wafted afforded a climate, as well as supply 

 of food, sufficient for their wants at all seasons of the year. And 

 this is eminently the case in the Azores ; accounting for Quail, 

 Wheatears, Woodcock, and Snipe, found as, according to Mr 

 Godman, they are (' Ibis,' 1866, p. 108), breeding and resident the 

 whole year. These two remote groups of islands, the Bermudas 

 and the Azores, have much in common, both lying far out in 

 the Atlantic, and both supporting an almost tropical vegetation ; 

 and though each have their occasional stragglers, the one of 

 American, the other of European type, yet there is this differ- 

 ence, — the Azores lie entirely out of the line of all migration. The 

 islands, as a whole, have an aggregate area of 700 square miles, 

 while that of the whole Bermuda group together is not more than 

 about 12,000 acres; besides which, the former contain high moun- 

 tain-ranges of 3000 feet and upwards, surmounted by the snow- 

 capped Pico, rearing its head nearly 8000 feet above the sea-level ; 

 while the orange and myrtle flourish beneath, at once affording a 

 sufficient change of climate and abundance of food at all seasons 

 of the year, especially to birds such as those mentioned, which 

 in the first instance have doubtless reached the islands as mere 



