168 BIEDS OF BERMUDA. 



dotted here and there with patches of highly-cultivated garden, that it is 

 hard to find birds, or, when found, to follow them up. Mosquitoes are 

 frightfully large and ferocious in summer and autumn, especially in and 

 around the ponds and swamps. Many a time have I lost a long- 

 expected shot by having to brush the little torments in dozens from my 

 nose and eyes. And as to believing a word the good-natured colored 

 people tell you about the extraordinary birds they see, it is simply 

 impossible. 



But, iu spite of these drawbacks, I enjoyed my ornithological labors 

 vastly, and look back with pleasure not only to the successful stalk or 

 lucky snap-shot which occasionally rewarded my exertions, but also to 

 the numerous instructive hours I passed, field-glass in hand, in the deep- 

 est recesses of the swamps or on the open shore, watching the agile 

 Mniotilta varia and the comical Totamis solitarius, or listening to the 

 loud musical "chip" of Seiurus noveboracensis, and the harsh, grating 

 cry of the Phaetons. 



In the following notes I have largely availed myself of those of Col- 

 onel Wedderburu (late Forty-second Highlanders) and Mr. Hurdis (for- 

 merly controller of customs in the islands), which have already been 

 given to the public in a little work, entitled " The Naturalist in Ber- 

 muda," to which I have before alluded; also of the collection of birds 

 formed, during the last twenty-five years, by Mr. Bartram, of Stocks 

 Point, near St. George's. I trust I may be held excused for the con- 

 stant references to these sources of information, both by the gentlemen 

 named and by the indulgent ornithological reader. Colonel Wedder- 

 buru and Mr. Hurdis compiled their valuable notes long before my time, 

 as may be inferred from the date of the book mentioned (1859) ; and 

 since their departure no one, except my friend Mr. J. M. Jones, apj)ears 

 to have kept any record of the bird-life of the islands — more's the pity. 

 With Mr. Bartram, now an elderly man, I struck np a great friendship, 

 and I spent many an afternoon poring over his birds. He has about 

 one hundred and twelve species, all collected and set up by himself, and 

 a carefully kept note-book relating to their capture. His collection is 

 the oidy one of any note iu the islands and contains numerous unique 

 examples of rare stragglers. An old soldier, settling at the expiration 

 of his service on the picturesque promontory of Stocks Point, where he 

 still resides, Mr. Bartram has added the study of natural science to that 

 of fanning; and, in addition to producing the best arrow-root in the 

 place, he has a turn at geology, conchology, ornithology, and several 



