100 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



boastful spirit, but in recognition of the fact that it is the result 

 simply of favouring circumstances, which it is perhaps hardly 

 necessary in this connection to enumerate. It is not therefore 

 wholly strange that the exigencies thereby developed should be 

 imperfectly appreciated by Old World authorities. When similar 

 opportunities for investigating the bird-life of other large areas 

 have been enjoyed, the convenience, if not the necessity, of 

 trinomial nomenclature will be more readily conceded — when 

 intergradations have been traced between many allied forms now 

 held to be specifically distinct ; for it is not supposable that North 

 America is exceptional in respect to the matter of geographical 

 variation in animal life under diverse conditions of environment, 

 resulting from differences of latitude, elevation, and climate. 



ZOOLOGICAL NOTES FROM GIBRALTAR. 

 By Capt. E. F. Becher, R.A. 



Being at Gibraltar during the spring of 1882 — from 28th 

 March to 5th April, again from 24th to 30th April, and from 25th 

 to 30th May — I paid particular attention to the vernal migration 

 of the birds visiting Tangiers, an excellent place for observation. 

 I was grievously disappointed. Olcese, the local naturalist, in- 

 formed me that he never remembered seeing so few migrants ; he 

 had only observed a few stragglers on the well-known plain 

 called the Marshan, which, according to Col. Irby, seems to be 

 "the starting-point of half the small birds which visit Europe." 

 Presumably the reason for this scarcity was the unusual drought 

 in the interior. As an example of the exceptionally dry season, 

 it may be stated that the registered rainfall at Gibraltar was about 

 17 inches against 56 the previous year. 



The sergeant at the signal station at Gibraltar observed very 

 few migrants passing over, and it would be interesting to know 

 the result of observations elsewhere — whether a falling off of the 

 number of migrants was observed in any other locality. The 

 drought, or some other cause, also appeared to have affected the 

 Lepidoptera, for butterflies on both sides of the Straits were 

 unusually scarce, even in the cork woods near the Rock — 

 generally such a favourite locality. 



A pair of Bonellis Eagles, N.fasciatus, bred as usual on the 



