164 Letters, Extracts, Notices, fyc. 



XL — Letters, Extracts, Notices, fyc. 



We liave received the following letters addressed to " The 

 Editors of The Ibis' ":— 



Sirs, — I have read Dr. Selah Merrill's paper on the Birds 

 of Palestine (' Ibis/ 1903, p. 324) with mingled feelings of 

 disappointment and satisfaction — of disappointment that so 

 energetic a collector, with many to assist him, should in four 

 whole years have been able to make so insignificant an 

 addition to the avifauna of the country ; of satisfaction at 

 the proof thus afforded that the country had been already 

 pretty thoroughly worked. 



Of the nine birds which Dr. Merrill has added to the list 

 it is unfortunate that he has omitted to give either the date 

 of capture or the locality. But of these, the Golden-eye, 

 the Common Sheldrake, the "White-tailed Plover, and Nord- 

 mann's Pratincole are all well-known wanderers in winter 

 over the Levant and the Red Sea. 



The Brambling and the Yellow-hammer are regular winter 

 visitants to Asia Minor, and might naturally go a little 

 further, to Palestine. The occurrence of the Bed-necked 

 Phalarope is interesting, though not surprising, as it has been 

 taken at Aden, Karachi, and even at Madras. The Slender- 

 billed Curlew (Numenius tenuirostris) is certainly a rare bird 

 everywhere, and well worth notice. 



As to the Lineated Cuckoo, called by Dr. Merrill Cuculus 

 leptodetus (really a synonym of C. gularis), which occurs on 

 the Nile, it is possible that Dr. Merrill may be right ; but the 

 species is so like our Common Cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) that 

 I should be unwilling to accept it unless on the authority of 

 an expert. 



In his five pages of criticism on my Catalogue the doctor 

 really asserts too much. His very first criticism is on the 

 Bock-Thrush, which I say " is a passing stranger tarrying 

 but a night." Though I do not say that it returns in autumn, 

 surely anyone would have understood that to be the case with 

 a migratory bird. 



Of the Hermit Fantail [Drymceca inquieta) I state that 



