CHAP, vi.] BIEDS THAT BREED IN MADEIRA DESCRIBED. 121 



up here during our hottest summers, nor frozen in the 

 severest winters. The swift preys on insects universally, 

 but throughout the summer on a moth which abounds so on 

 our most parched and sterile serras, tbat what with the 

 insects and the birds the place seems all alive. The snipe 

 requires a tolerable quantity of poachy, moist, decomposing 

 soil, for the production of its food, and this, even in winter, 

 is both scarce and very local, while at other times there is not 

 a square yard in the whole island ; and the swallow requires 

 insects which are found only over streams, and something 

 approaching to rivers, which we make but a sorry figure in 

 at the wettest of seasons, and are entirely without six months 

 in twelve." 



The Ring-dove appears to be rather larger than the Eng- 

 lish bird, in other respects it is similar ; it lives in the forests 

 on the north side of the island. 



The Long-toed Wood Pigeon has been described by Dr. 

 Heineken in Brewster's Journal, under the name of Co- 

 lumba trocaz. It is about an inch longer than the Ma- 

 deiran ring-dove ; one of its chief peculiarities, and which 

 seems to have escaped observation, is the great length 

 of its centre toe, being more than an inch longer than 

 that of the ring-dove; it has a silvery ring all round its 

 neck,and is darker in its general plumage than the ring- 

 dove. It inhabits the forests on the north side of the 

 island, feeding upon grasses and the acorns of the laurel 

 trees. 



The Rock Pigeon inhabits the sea cliffs and rocks in the 

 ravines all over the island : there is a variety here which is 

 darker in its plumage and in the colour of its feet than the 

 common rock pigeon. Purchas relates that " at first the 

 pigeons suffered themselves to be taken, not knowing, and 



G 



