128 Letters, Extracts from Correspondence, Notices, ^c. 



sidered the same as the true S. parasiticus of Linnaeus and Briin- 

 uich. But Mr. Coues has discovered several specimens of Skuas 

 from Arctic America in the Smithsonian Institution which " agree 

 minutely ^^ with Swainson's plate and figure, and appear to possess 

 differential characters* which indicate the existence in Arctic 

 America (of a second Skua) allied to S. parasiticus. With re- 

 gard to the fourth and fifth species, we believe them to be pure 

 figments, like many other "species" manufactured during the 

 declining hours of the late Prince Bonaparte. 



Professor Baird has commenced publishing in the same Aca- 

 demy's Proceedings some " Notes on the Birds of Jamaica, by 

 W. L. March," who has been collecting in that island for the 

 Smithsonian Institution. The present portion refers to the 

 Accipitres and Cuculidce. Among the former is Cathartes atra- 

 tus — a " recent settler in Jamaica/' not known to Mr. Gosse. 



Mr. Lawrence has kindly forwarded to us a new part of his 

 catalogue of the birds collected in Panama by Mr. J. McLeannan, 

 containing additional species, and notes and remarks on former 

 published species t> The total number of species obtained by 

 Mr. McLeannan, who is, we believe, superintendent at one of 

 the stations of the railway, amounts now to 415. Petrochelidon 

 albilinea, Lawrence, we suppose to be the same Swallow as that 

 recently described by Mr. Salvin J as P. littorea. 



X. — Letters, Extracts from Correspondence, Notices, ^c. 



3 have re 

 Editor " '.— 



We have received the following letters addressed " To the 



Porto S. Giorgio, September 12, 1863 

 (Italy, Marche). 

 Before reading, in the last Number of your periodical (July 

 1863)j Mr. H. B. Tristram's observations on what I had pre- 



* "Major; rostro, tarsis alisque longioribus ; Cauda magis producta et 

 rotundata, rectricibus latioiibus" (I. c. p. 135). 



X " Catalogue of a Collection of Birds made in New Granada, by James 

 McLeannan, Esq., of New York, with Notes and Descriptions of New 

 Species." Pt. 4. Ann. Lye. Nat. Ilist. New York, vol. viii. (May 18()3). 



t P. Z. S. 1862, p. 189. 



