~M. Neeker on the Birds of Geneva. 277 



iHtgratoria,) the first which has occurred in this country, was 

 shot in Fifeshire in January last, and presented to the Uni- 

 versity Museum by the llev. Dr Fleming. 



The number of species of birds found in the canton of Ge- 

 neva, and neighbouring mountains, amount to 242, of which 

 185 are, properly speaking, indigenous, and 57 are acciden- 

 tal. Of the 185 indigenous species, 95 belong to the low 

 grounds, (of which 32 are stationary all the year, and 63 are 

 birds of passage ;) 31 species belong to the mountains ; — 37 

 are marsh and shore birds, (of which three are stationary, and 

 34 birds of passage ;) — and, lastly, 22 inhabit the lake, one 

 species only being stationary, the others birds of passage. 



Of the 57 species of accidental visitors, 20 belong to the 

 plain, 16 are marsh and shore birds, and 21 water birds. 



At the conclusion of the Memoir, M. Neeker gives his Or- 

 nithological Calendar, in which, like the similar list of Mr 

 Markwick, he gives the dates of the earliest arrival and de- 

 parture of all the migratory birds which he has mentioned as 

 frequenting the neigbourhood of Geneva. These two calen- 

 dars are interesting, as affording the means of comparing the 

 arrival and departure of migratory birds in two portions of 

 Europe at a distance from each other ; and had they been 

 for corresponding years, the results would have been more 

 satisfactory. From a slight glance at both, the progress of mi- 

 gration does not seem to be so rapid and continuous asmany con- 

 ceive it ; but to proceed by stages, as it were, as the animals 

 from the southward find subsistence on their route. There 

 seems no reason, indeed, for supposing it to be otherwise ; but 

 still it would be interesting to know, from a series of such ob- 

 servations, the time taken by birds of the most rapid flight, to 

 traverse such an extent of surface ; and to have the means 

 of investigating the causes which stop some species at deter- 

 mined geographical positions, while others, as the swallow, are 

 found scattered in every country of northern Europe. The ear- 

 liest arrival of the swallow ( Hirundo rustica) is marked in the 

 Genevan Calendar on the 18th of March 1806 — the latest pe- 

 riod 10th April 1810; while, in Mr Markwick's table, the 

 earliest arrival of the same bird is April 7, 1788, and the 

 latest April 27, 1771. The swallow leaves the neigh- 



