480 Recently published Ornithological Works. 



Hunters. Lying more than twenty miles west of the Island of 

 Lewis, and forty miles to the north-east of St. Kilda, these 

 remote and uninhabited islets have rarely been visited, even 

 by naturalists, and Mr. Harvie-Brown's pioneer experiences 

 in 1881 summed up our former knowledge of the fauna. In 

 1899, however, a lighthouse was completed on Eilean Mor, the 

 largest of the group, and thenceforth Mr. Harvie-Brown and 

 Mr. Engle Clarke regularly received schedules recording the 

 occurrences of birds. These indicated that a stream of migra- 

 tion swept over the islands both in spring and autumn ; for 

 which reason Mr. Clarke and Mr. T. G. Laidlaw arranged 

 to spend sixteen days on Eilean Mor, from September 6th to 

 21st, in 1904. We have already been told of the remarkable 

 acquisition of the Short-toed Lark (cf. supra, p. 115) and 

 of the abundance of Lapland Buntings ; but now a detailed 

 and very interesting list of some eighty species of birds is 

 furnished. One feature noted was a migration of Jack Snipes 

 in " vast packs," and, from evidence up to the present, it 

 appears to have been unusual ; the stay of the birds was for 

 barely more than a day. For good or for evil — chiefly the 

 latter — a good deal has been written about St. Kilda, but the 

 first instalment (pp. 75-80) of Notes on the Birds of that 

 group of islets promises well. These notes are compiled 

 by the Rev. J. B. Mackenzie from memoranda made by his 

 father, who lived in St. Kilda from 1829-1813, and took a 

 great interest in birds. There is no new information at first 

 hand about the Great Auk. Among the general notes is an 

 interesting record by Mr. Eagle Clarke of the nesting of the 

 Storm-Petrel on the Bass Roek, this being the first instance 

 for the east side of the mainland of Great Britain. The 

 occurrence was erroneously attributed to the Fork-tailed 

 Petrel by the Rev. H. N. Bonar (' Field/ Nov. 19, 1904), 

 and was received with deserved scepticism. — H. S. 



62. ( The Auk: 



[The Auk. A Quarterly Journal of Ornithology. Vol. xxii. Nos. 1 

 & '2, January and April 1905.] 



The first paper in our contemporary is by Professor Wells 



