166 Letters, Extracts, Notices, &^'c. 



peditioii under Sir John Ross. He valued the specimens 

 exceedingly, as he believed them to be the only ones ever 

 procured actually on the Antarctic Continent. He told me 

 that he was the first person who set foot on shore after Sir 

 John Ross, and that as they were walking on the ice he saw 

 the Sheathbill running along the edge and shot it. Shortly 

 afterwards he shot the White Petrel, which was retrieved by 

 the boat. The birds are labelled " H.M.S. ' Terror/ 1842, 

 lat. 78° South." I cannot find any record of the White 

 Sheathbill having been taken further south than lat. 64°. 



Yours &c., 

 Durham, October 31, 1894. H. B. Tristram. 



Sirs, — In September last a variety of the Solitary Pigeon, 

 or "Monte Dove'' {Engyptila chalcauchenia) , almost white, 

 was brought by a peon to a friend of mine residing in the 

 Department of Flores in the Banda Oriental. I believe that 

 " white varieties " are not very common among wild 

 Pigeons. Yours &c., 



Bloxhara, Oxon, O. V. Aplin. 



November 12, 1894. 



Sirs, — In response to the request for information as to 

 how the birds of prey carry their legs in fiight {' Ibis,' 1894, 

 pp. 557 & 558), I venture to inform you that on August 1 2th 

 last, while walking from Brunswick to W^olfenbiittel, I saw 

 a large Hawk, probably a Goshawk, the legs of which were 

 certainly carried projecting backwards, like those of the 

 Stork. I regret very much that I had no glasses with me, 

 and so was unable to identify the bird with certainty (having 

 never seen Astur palumbarius in a wild state before). I 

 watched it, however, for some little time, as on its first 

 appearance at some distance away it had a distinctly Stork- 

 like appearance on the wing, and I was quite unprepared to 

 find this bird carrying its legs in flight in this manner. 



Yours &c., 

 Gerald E. H. Barrett-Hamilton. 



Kilmanock, New Ross, Ireland, 

 October 29, 1894. 



