Lord Lilford^s Cruise in the Mediterranean. 5 



siderable flights of Woodcocks and wildfowl. There is a great 

 breeding-place of Gulls on la Gabinera^ a rocky islet south of 

 the middle island : but I was not in a condition for explora- 

 tion ; so we sailed again for Cannes on the 29thj and^ with 

 light head-winds and calms^ arrived there at 9 p.m. the same 

 day, seeing no birds on our way but a few Gulls and two or 

 three Shearwaters. At Cannes we remained three zooloffi- 

 cally profitless weeks, and I had a return of my malady, which 

 prevented my ever getting ashore ; but we found many friends 

 amongst the large and steadily increasing English colony 

 there, whose attention and kindness made the time pass 

 quickly. My yacht- steward, who had passed many years 

 collecting and preserving objects of natural history in Aus- 

 tralia, and is a good hand at the business, brought me off 

 various birds from the market, amongst others, Turdus tor- 

 quatus, Coccothraustes vulgaris, Caccabis rufa, Caccabis pe- 

 trosa (from Sardinia), Anas clypeata, A. crecca, A. acuta, 

 Mareca penelope, Fuligula ferina, Mergus merganser, and 

 Scolopax rusticola. A friend whom we found there, a High- 

 lander, and devoted to the gun, told me that amongst the 

 pine-clad hills which surround Cannes, he had in about two 

 months' constant rambles met with two Woodcocks, four 

 Partridges, an Owl, and many foxes ; so I cannot recommend 

 Cannes as a shooting-locality. The climate is certainly fine; 

 but in all this part of the Mediterranean coast the sudden 

 piercing cold at sunset is especially to be guarded against, 

 and must, I think, be prejudicial to the class of invalids who 

 principally resort thither. The Russians and our Trans- 

 atlantic cousins have monopolized Nice, the climate of which 

 place, pace the faculty, is in my opinion simply abominable ; 

 and our country people have gone to the eastward, and are 

 establishing themselves along the lovely Riviera from Men- 

 tone to Savona, where the climate in winter really is fine, 

 and the countiy interesting and comparatively little known. 

 I speak from experience, having passed some nine months in 

 this part of Europe, and sailed, walked, ridden, driven, and 

 steamed along and almost all over it. I found that, while to 

 the westward of the Maritime Alps the peasantry are boorish^ 



