EECOLLECTIONS. 3 



Sussex. It is true that such countless myi^iads of 

 water-birds are not found here during the sum- 

 mer months as at Down-Patrick Head,* or on the 

 Stags of Broadhaven,-)- but certain members of the 

 great natatorial division are met with during the 

 breeding season on different parts of the coast 

 between Brighton and Hastings, and several of 

 the rarer species occur during the winter, occa- 

 sionally, indeed, in such numbers, as to furnish 

 ample occupation, and many a valuable acquisi- 

 tion, to the sportsman and to the collector. 



But although Sussex cannot pretend to vie 

 with the distant shores of the Sister Island, or 

 the north of Scotland, in the number of hyper- 

 borean visitors, there is perhaps no portion of 

 the United Kingdom that contains a greater 

 variety of the summer birds of passage. A glance 

 at the map will suffice to show you that our 

 proximity to the continent, and the long line of 

 shore from Kent to Hampshire, are favourable 

 to an immigration of those feathered tribes, 

 which, having passed the winter in the olive 



* A lofty, isolated rock, near the mainland, on the 

 precipitous coast of Mayo. A regular Babel of sea- 

 birds during the month of May. 



t A cluster of small islands outside the natural haven 

 of the same name. 



b2 



