THE IBIS. 



EIGHTH SERIES. 



No. XX. OCTOBER 1905. 



XXXIV. — On a Collection of Birds from Somaliland. By 

 Harry F. Witherby. With Field-notes by the Collector, 

 Captain A. E. Hamerton, R.A.M.C., D.S.O. 



(Plate X.) 



The collection which is described in the following pages was 

 made by my friend Capt. A. E. Hamerton, while on active 

 service with the Somaliland Field Force in 1903-4. Capt. 

 Hamerton experienced many difficulties in making the 

 collection, owing to military exigencies. He had the ill- 

 fortune also to lose several little collections and many odd 

 skins in various ways. For instance, all his boxes had to be 

 abandoned on one crossing of the terrible Haud, so that 

 it was only by dint of great perseverance that he was able to 

 send home any skins at all. 



Many Somaliland collections have been described in ' The 

 Ibis/ but most of them have been made in Western Somali- 

 land, whereas a large number of Capt. Hatnerton's birds 

 were obtained in Eastern Somaliland. For this reason the 

 specimens, although so few, are extremely interesting. The 

 Larks, with several distinctly new forms, are of special note, 



SER. viii. — vol. v. 2 M 



