MEDITERRANEAN NOTES 223 



lesser black-backed gulls, shearwaters, some porpoises, and 

 near Adra a flight of cranes making the Spanish coast 

 from the southward." 



VALENCIA 



"March list. Senor Arevalo told me that Sylvia 

 melanopogon is not uncommon here, but was formerly much 

 more so (sic) near Malaga, and that its eggs vary quite 

 as much in colour as those of Cisticcla. He also told me 

 of the occurrence on the Albufera of the African pelican 

 (Pelecanus onocrotalus\ and of a specimen of Chelidon, which 

 they cannot determine." 



" March 22nd. Don Manuel Cabelle came and sat 

 with me for some time. He says that this has been 

 a wonderfully good season for wild-fowl on the Albufera ; 

 he asked T. to go out and join him at the fishing 

 village at the Albufera to-morrow evening, to shoot the 

 next day. He tells me of a bird three times the size 

 of a swan ! entirely white ! ! and about five feet high ! ! ! 

 shot near here, and now to be seen stuffed at the Casino 

 de los Cazadores ; this must surely be a myth, but 

 requires investigation." 



" March i^th. Don Jose Arevalo, bringing with 

 him the unknown Chelidon, which is, as far as I can 

 see, nothing but a common house martin (Chelidon urbica}. 

 Don Jose stayed some time, and gave me a memento 

 in the shape of a sketch of the head of a pallid swift 



