7506 Birds. 



shall not attempt to take a " philosopbic " or comprehensive view of this impulse or 

 law of Nature, but I would remark in passing that birds of the air, fishes of the sea, 

 and beasts of the earth, are alike guided and directed by an instinctive and inscrutable 

 law, implanted in them at the creation, but of which we can form no conception, it 

 being foreign to our nature. But that it is an imperative law, and one that cannot 

 be transgressed, and which they have no more power to disobey than they have to resist 

 death when they have run out their allotted span of life, there can be no question ; so 

 that at a certain season — not to say moment of time — myriads of birds, myriads of fish, 

 are simultaneously constrained to move in a certain or given direction, and that too 

 with unerring precision ; whereas man, with reason to guide him, would be at a loss 

 to direct his course, either by land or sea, even for a few hundred miles. It may be 

 asked, how comes it if this instinctive law be so imperative that stragglers of this 

 migratory tribe are so frequently observed when the main body has departed ? In reply 

 to this I would stale that my observations lead me to believe that none but immature 

 or weakly birds that are compelled to do so prolong their stay, and consequently count 

 for nothing when we take a comprehensive view of the migratory habits of the swal- 

 low.— £?. Hadfield; Venlnor, Isle of Wight, April 3, 1861. 



Occurrence of the Great Spotted Woodpecker {V\c\xs major) in Northamptonshire. — 

 I saw a splendid male specimen of this most beautiful and rare woodpecker the other 

 day, in the shop of a taxidermist of this town. On inquiry I found that it had been 

 shot a few days since, in a wood about two miles from here, by a gamekeeper. I under- 

 stand that a nest of young of this bird, one of which I saw stuffed in the same shop, 

 was taken last year not far from the same place. There may be some excuse for a 

 gamekeeper shooting a strange bird in his preserves, but there is none for a man taking 

 a nest of young woodpeckers, which could not be kept alive for any length of lime. 

 Every naturalist and every gentleman must regret and ought to discourage, and if 

 possible prevent, such wanton proceedings. Two specimens, male and female, of the 

 spotted woodpecker (Pictis minor), have also been lately shot in the same wood. — 

 Henry P. Hensman, Hon. Sec. Northampton Mechanics' Institute Natural History 

 Society ; March 20, 1861. 



The Blue Rock Pigeon. — " Alceste Island " — the name of which recalls the 

 splendours of a former Embassy to China, and many pleasant associations connected 

 with the Narrative of Staunton and the Voyages of Captains Maxwell and Basil Hall, 

 not forgetting Surgeon Macleod's 'Voyage of the Alceste' — is a little high island 

 placed to the north at the extremity of the Shan-lung Promontory, the easternmost 

 continuation of the lofty peninsula which forms the Province of Shan-tung. On the 

 rocks above water, which form a portion of the reef which extends about a mile round 

 the island, lie huddled together numbers of seals, which, on our approach in the boat, 

 all tumble off into the water. The fishing cormorant {Carlo chinensis) evidently 

 thinks these rocks an eligible station, and from them the captain shoots a beautiful 

 white spoonbill with a lemon-coloured crest, as he pulls ashore in his galley. Geese, 

 ducks and gulls are also congregated together here in goodly numbers. Indeed, 

 besides the blue rock pigeon, which appears to have regularly taken possession of and 

 to have colonised " Hai-leu," which is the proper Chinese name, the number and 

 variety of the birds which make it their dwelling-place is remarkable. Swallows build 

 in the caves, which are hollowed out in parts of the huge trachyte cliffs ; here and 

 there a giant pinnacle — a secure eyrie for the eagle and the kite. In the chasms of 

 the steep precipices, where the sun glints on vast surfaces of shining silvery micaceous 



