Mr. C. A. Wright's Visit to Fi/fla. 435 



None, however, as far as I am aware, stay to breed. Geese and 

 Swans I did not observe ; but most certainly some species of 

 these also come to us, as they descend to much lower latitudes 

 on the coast of China. I may here remark that a Black Scoter 

 Duck, shot by Capt. Blakiston on the Yangtsze, turned out to 

 be the American Black Duck [CEdemia americana, Swainson), 

 and not the European (E. nigra as one would have expected. I 

 have never met with this Duck, and have not, therefore, included 

 it in my list. 



XXXIII. — A Visit to the Islet of Filfla, on the South Coast of 

 Malta. By Charles A. Wright. 



Starting at 7 a.m., on the 16th of May last, with two friends, 

 in a go-cart from Sliema, on the north side of Malta, we reached 

 the sea-side opposite Filfla at about half-past nine o'clock a.m. 

 Filfla is an isolated rock, less than half a mile long, and scarcely 

 a quarter broad, situate on the south coast of Malta, some three 

 or four miles off the shore. On our way from Sliema to the sea- 

 coast, we saw a great many Coi'vus monedula, the only sedentary 

 representative of the Corvine family in Malta. I thought I recog- 

 nized two or three Corvus frugilegus, but, owing to the distance, 

 was not quite sure. The Rook is a bird of passage here, arriving 

 in autumn, and sometimes staying the winter and part of spring. 

 I noticed it this year, beyond all doubt, as late as the beginning 

 of April. It generally leaves long before that time, probably to 

 find a suitable breeding-country further north. In the fields by 

 the roadside several Common Buntings and Short-toed Larks 

 were breeding, and a few Swifts were chasing insects in the 

 higher regions of the air. A Turtle-Dove, a Spectacled Warbler, 

 and several Spotted Flycatchers caught our view as we drove 

 along, and every farmhouse had its colony of noisy Sparrows 

 {Passer salicicola). The Spectacled Warbler (the only indigenous 

 Warbler of the island) is also now breeding. On nearing the 

 cliffs on the southern coast, we again fell in with our friends 

 the Jackdaws in great numbers. They appeared to have nests 

 or young ones, as several of the old birds were carrying some- 

 thing in their mouths. A pair of Blue Thrushes {Petrociticla 



