Letters, Extracts from Currespondence, Notices, ^c. 469 



week after next, if the Canicular holds out fine. This expedition, 

 if it conies off, will, I expect, result in something satisfactory. 

 Anyhow the scenery will repay the undertaking, as being per- 

 haps the most magnificent which Central America can produce." 



To the Editor of The Ibis. - 



Kilmory, Lochgilphead, N.B. 

 Dear Sir, — On going last month to my father's property 

 in the Hebrides (North Uist), the keeper told me that at the 

 end of March 1859 he had shot a Falcon that he did not know. 

 Unfortunately he only wounded it ; and when he found it after- 

 wards, the gulls and crows, which abound there, had made a sad 

 mess of it. He kept the wings, tail and feet, and skull, and I 

 think there is no doubt it is F. islandicus or grcenlandicus. I 

 heard the other day of the occurrence of the Shore Lark [Alauda 

 alpestris) in Scotland ; I am to get place and date, and will send 

 them to you. A Pintail Duck {Dafila caudacuta) was shot this 

 spi'ing in North Uist. It is rare in the Hebrides from what I 

 hear : the keeper had not seen one before. The Falcon was 

 shot on the N.W. side of the island; but, with a bird of such 

 power of flight, this does not say much as to what quarter it 



came from. 



I remain, 



Yours truly, 



John W. F. Orde. 



Mr. Guruey has favoured us with a number of the San Fran- 

 cisco Herald, which contains a notice by Mr. A. S. Taylor of 

 Monterey of the discovery of the egg of the Californian Vulture 

 [Cathartes calif ornianus) . Mr. Gurney expects to receive the 

 egg in question very shortly. The following is an extract from 

 Mr. Taylor's article : — 



" One of the rancheros of the Carmelo, in hunting among 

 the highest peaks of the Santa Lucia range during the last 

 week of April present, disturbed two Condors from their nests, 

 and, at great risk of breaking his neck, brought away a young 

 bird six or seven days old, and also an egg — the egg from one 



