Mr. A. Newton's two Days at Madeira. 185 



XIX. — Two Days at Madeira. 

 By Alfred Newton, M.A., F.L.S., F.Z.S. 



To a naturalist, beyond any other traveller, I think, the 

 aspect of a country he is visiting for the first time, in whatso- 

 ever part of the world it may lie, is a matter of great and never- 

 ending interest. This interest is, of course, greatest in the case 

 of a country whose natural productions are entirely unknown ; 

 but it would not be inconsiderable even in one, if such there be, 

 whose fauna and flora have been already thoroughly worked out. 

 It accordingly follows that localities of the intermediate and 

 most numerous class, where the animals and plants are already 

 more or less catalogued, must possess an interest inversely pro- 

 portionate to the amount of facts which are on record concerning 

 them. Such an instance of the middle class is ofiered by the 

 cluster of islands known as the Madeiras, the field wherein one 

 of the most reflective and diligent zoologists of our time has so 

 long laboured. Even of those among us who take no special 

 heed of entomology, there can scarcely be one who has not 

 been charmed with the writings of Mr. Wollaston, whether from 

 the ardent love of nature and the keen powers of observation 

 they betray, or the masterly handling of results and the sound 

 inductive philosophy they evince. Ornithologists may well wish 

 that a naturalist so gifted had paid as much attention to the 

 birds of the Madeiras as to its beetles, and this without in any 

 way depreciating the useful information respecting the former, 

 furnished at various times by Mr. Edward Vernon Harcourt*. 

 It is rather in the hope of encouraging some one who may have 

 the opportunity of further studying Madeiran ornithology that 

 I venture to offer the following remarks ; for I myself, during my 

 late short visit, collected no specimens, and made no personal 

 observations, possessing any novelty. 



The European character of the Madeiran fauna is well known. 



* " Notice ofthe Birds of Madeira," P.Z.S., 1851, pp. 141-146, reprinted 

 in Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist. 2nd ser. vol. xii. pp. 58-63 ; * A Sketch 

 of Madeira,' London, 1851, pp. 115-123; "Description of a New Species 

 of Regulus from Madeira," P. Z. S., 1854, p. 153; and " Notes on the 

 Ornithology of Madeira," Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., 2nd ser. vol. xv. pp. 

 430-438. 



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