212 Recently Published Ornithological Works. 



J. Stevenson Hamilton, Warden of the Transvaal Game 

 Reserve, found the avifauna similar to that of the Transvaal 

 Low Country, rather than to that of more northern districts. 

 A third paper consists of Notes from Cape Colony by Mr. 

 L. E. Taylor, and includes details of the nesting of various 

 species, such as Aquila verreauxi and Sula capensis, besides 

 observations on the distribution and capture of rare forms. 

 Next Mr. A. Haagner furnishes us with miscellaneous notes 

 from the Transvaal Museum, among which we may remark 

 that the writer considers Plectropterus niger inseparable 

 from P. yambensis, while he describes as new Bradypterus 

 congoensis from West Pondoland, a form akin to B. sylvaticus. 

 Lastly, Mr. F. Pym gives a lengthy catalogue of the birds of 

 the Kaffiarian frontier near Kingwilliamstown. 



27. Spruce on the Migration of the IVood-Ibis. 



[Notes of a Botanist on the Amazon and Audes. By Richard Spruce, 

 Ph.D. Edited by A. I J. Wallace. 2 vols. London: Macmillan & Co., 

 1908.] 



Although the late Dr. Spruce's Journals (recently edited by 

 Dr. Wallace) are, of course, mainly devoted to botany, there 

 are occasional references to birds in the narratives of that 

 great traveller and collector. Amongst these is an account 

 of the migration of the Wood-Ibis (Tantalus locu/a/or) as 

 observed by Dr. Spruce in several places between the 

 Amazon and Orinoco, which is of such interest that we 

 venture to reproduce it in this Journal : — 



" The most remarkable migration that I have myself 

 witnessed in South America is that of the great Wood-Ibis 

 (Tantalus loculator), called ' Jabirii ' in Brazil, 'Ganau' in 

 Venezuela, between the Amazon and the Orinoco — a distance 

 of from 300 to 500 miles in a straight line, but a thousand 

 or more following the courses of the rivers. The migrations 

 are so timed that the birds are always on the one river or 

 the other when the water is lowest and there is much sandy 

 beach exposed, affording the greatest extent of fishing- 

 ground. In the years 1853 and 1854, when I was at San 

 Carlos del Rio Negro (lat. 1° 53^' S.), I saw them going 



