Birds' Skins and Eggs from Ascension Island, 273 



to be thrown away^ being entirely destroyed by " hardbacks " 

 and other insects^ which seemed positively to thrive on the 

 meat dosed with carbolic acid. However, after the expedition 

 to Boatswain-bird Island, Mr. Unwin, one of the residents 

 on the island, an enthusiastic lover of natural history, kindly 

 offered to skin any birds that might be brought him and to 

 preserve them ; and most beautifully has he done so. 



The Island of Ascension is merely a large cinder-heap in 

 the midst of the Atlantic, nearly a thousand miles from the 

 nearest point of the mainland of Africa; its exact position is 

 lat. 7^ 55' S., long. 14° 25' W. The only vegetation exists 

 as a cap to the highest point, which is significantly called 

 ^'^ Green Mountain." The water-supply is very precarious, 

 and is carefully looked after by the inhabitants for them- 

 selves and their domestic animals, which are donkeys, cattle, 

 sheep, and a few fowls and pigeons. On the more inacces- 

 sible parts of the island a few goats, that have run wdld, 

 manage to pick up a scanty living ; and there are numerous 

 wild cats [i. e. cats that have run wild, and their descendants), 

 which, for many montlis in the year, must live in clover, 

 owing to the enormous supply of young birds spread before 

 them. From the above it will be seen that any land-birds 

 there have not a very favourable chance of multiplying ; and 

 Mr. Gill only once saw any Guinea-fowl. Still in past years 

 these birds, which constitute the game of the island, were 

 much more numerous, and the ofl&cers stationed there had 

 fair sport for a short time. No reference will be made to 

 the land-birds, which are known to have been transported 

 there ; besides the Guinea-fowl mentioned above, a fair num- 

 ber of a species of Estrelda live amongst the herbage of 

 Green Mountain. Ascension, to the ornithologist, is an 

 island of great interest, from the fact that any notices of strag- 

 glers found there may have considerable value as bearing on 

 geographical distribution ; and although its resident birds are 

 fairly well known, yet I feel sure that there must be, at pe- 

 riods more or less widely distant, occasional wanderers, the 

 appearance of which it would be of great importance to record. 

 For instance, Mr. Howard Saunders informs me that Mr. 



