85 [Vol. xxi. 



39 & 40. Wryneck (lynx torguilla) , showing the protective 



colouring of the plnmage. 

 41-47. Robin [Erithacus rubeculd) with a young Cuckoo 



[Cuculus canorus), showing the diflferent kind of 



food selected for the Cuckoo, as compared with that 



used for its own young. 



Dr. ScLATER gave a short account of a visit he had recently 

 made to Algeria during the months of February and March. 

 Most of his time had been passed at Algiers. The environs 

 of that city were certainly very birdless, owing, as he was 

 told, to the practice of pot-hunting for small birds. 



The large collection of birds made by Loche, the author 

 of the ' Catalogue des Mammiferes et Oiseaux de I'Algerie/ 

 and given by him (or by his widow after his death) to the 

 Municipality of Algiers, had been broken up and dispersed 

 some fifteen years ago, and there was now no collection of 

 native birds at Algiers except a small mounted series in a 

 wooden building in the garden of the National Museum of 

 Antiquities at Mustapha Superior. This collection had been 

 formed to illustrate Algeria in the Exhibition of the products 

 of the French Colonies held at Marseilles two years ago, but 

 had been subsequently moved to its present situation. 



Dr. Sclater had passed a week at Biskra, an oasis in 

 the Sahara, south of the Atlas, where birds were more 

 abundant. There he had met Mr. Walter Rothschild and 

 Dr. Hartert, who were on a collecting-tour in Algeria, and 

 had accompanied them on some of their excursions into 

 the surrounding desert, where Chats, Larks, and Sand- 

 Grouse were the prevalent forms of bird- life. 



Dr. Sclater exhibited a photograph of a native falconer 

 with his hawks, taken at Biskra. The birds were apparently 

 Falco sacer. 



