NOTES AND QUERIES. 469 



cinereicollis (Fauna des Roth. Meer., no. 242), of which I have compared 

 the typical specimen, is not different." 



As a distinguished ornithologist has, in a recently received letter, 

 objected to the specific name nigris, on the ground that it is not the 

 genitive of niger, it may be well to point out that it is not intended as 

 such, but is the genitive of the more classical name for the Niger, viz. 

 Nigris, is. — Ed.] 



Migration of Wagtails. — An extraordinary visitation of the common 

 Pied Wagtail took place here on Sept. 23rd, a little after 8 p.m. Attracted 

 by the gaslight, numbers of these birds flew in through the open windows 

 of several rooms in the United Services College, where they fluttered wildly 

 and helplessly about, battering themselves like so many large moths against 

 the ceiling. In one room alone there were as many as thirty. The night 

 was dark and stormy, and it is not improbable that these birds, which breed 

 in abundance in the cliffs along Bideford Bay, had been across the water to 

 Lundy for the purpose of feeding, and in their return home had lost their 

 way in the darkness and rain, and then made for the beacon afforded by the 

 long line of gaslights at the College. If this be not the explanation of 

 the case, the birds must have been really migrating, and that in a south or 

 south-easterly direction (the windows face north); for though the Pied 

 Wagtail is not strictly a migratory bird, the fact that all birds migrate more 

 or less, if only from one part of the island to another, is becoming every 

 year more firmly established. The occurrence will then only be an excep- 

 tional instance of what happens so commonly at lighthouses during the 

 spring and autumn migrations. — H. A. Evans (Westward Ho, N. Devon). — 

 The Times, 2nd Oct. 1883. 



[The periodical migration of the Pied Wagtail, as observed in Sussex, 

 has been well described by Mr. A. E. Knox in 'The Zoologist' for 1843, 

 and in his ' Ornithological Rambles.' — Ed.] 



Waders on the South Coast. — While staying some time at St. Leonards 

 lately, my son aud I made a few expeditious with our guns to Rye Nook and 

 on by the Midrips towards Lydd. We got most of the usual Waders, and 

 other species of birds which I have seen there for the last thirty years. Oi_ 

 August 23rd I shot two Dusky Redshanks out of a flock of five. On the 

 28th Common Terns had taken their departure, many Little Terns still 

 remaining, and Sanderlings had arrived. On Sept. 3rd, at Bexhill Marsh 

 (no guns), we saw a Grey Phalarope (an early arrival) swimming close to us 

 in a small strip of water: it kept uttering a little sharp "twit twit" at 

 short intervals. We also saw there a Bar-tailed Godwit. On Sept. 4th my 

 son killed a Golden Plover at the Midrips, surely a very early arrival so far 

 south. On Sept. 13th we got a Little Stint [Tringa minuta), aud some 

 Oystercatchers on the shore. We found that on the 5th one of the 



