394 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
16-bore was lying snug and safe in my cabin, ready to add to the 
Bermuda lists when called upon. 
We left Gibraltar on the 12th, but did not land in Bermuda till 
March 30th, owing to a pleasant head-wind and somewhat limited 
powers of locomotion. My note-book was started next day,—our 
first on shore,—and was religiously kept up from that time till 
June 3rd, 1875, when | left again for English soil. 
In this brief sketch, and in face of the heading assigned to it, I 
must needs confine myself to the birds alone; aud it would be out 
of place were I to altempt any description of the islands them- 
selves, their inhabitants, scenery, or productions. 
Situated in lat. 32° 15’ N., and long. 64° 51’ W., six hundred 
miles or more from the great North American continent, and 
exposed to the full force of ever-varying gales, the long, narrow 
group of islands known as the “ Bermudas” offer a harbour of 
refuge to many a weary, storm-beaten migrant on its passage north 
or south, and in consequence we find a great many genera of the 
North American avi-fauna represented in the visiting list. On this 
subject my friend Mr. J. Matthew Jones, of the Middle Temple, 
editor of ‘The Naturalist in Bermuda’ (1859), remarks—“ That the 
Bermudas afford an excellent position from whence to observe the 
annual migration of many species of the feathered tribes of America 
cannot be doubted. Equidistant, or nearly so, from the shores of 
Nova Scotia, the United States, and the West Indian archipelago, 
they present, as it were, a casual resting-place to many birds 
while traversing the broad expanse of ocean which forms the 
eastern limit of their great line of flight.” 
Some species, as the American Golden Plover, American Snipe, 
Sora Rail, Night Hawk, Chordeiles virginianus, Yellowshanks, &c., 
seldom fail to appear every autumn, and may be set down as 
regular visitors, probably from the fact that their line of migration 
is direct from the north-eastern coasts of the continent to the West 
Indies and tropical South America; but, as will presently be seen, 
the great bulk of the recorded species are irregular or accidental 
visitors, whose migratory journeys are less ambitious, and who are 
blown off the mainland by unfavourable winds. That fresh species 
will from time to time be added to the present list is more than 
probable ; in fact, it is possible that the whole. avi-fauna of North 
America may eventually be recorded as Bermudian. When such 
diminutive flyers as the Ruby-throated Humming-bird, Trochilus 
