ZOOLOGY OP FERNANDO NORONIIA. 
477 
as common as on the mainland. It swarms everywhere, and is 
so tame that it is often caught by the hand. I have seen one in 
the evening on the top of the inflorescence of a Crotalaria , 
apparently devouring the young seed-pods. Albinos are often 
seen. There being no birds or beasts of prey to keep these 
animals in check, and food being particularly abundant, they 
have increased enormously, and one of the employments of a 
convict is to capture a certain number of rats and mice once a 
month. At the monthly rat-hunt while we were on the island 
over 3900 were taken ; but we were assured that, in the dry 
season, when the herbage which covered the greater part of the 
island was dried up and burnt, the mice were compelled to leave 
their holes, and many more were taken. The hunts are then 
undertaken weekly, and 20,000 have been caught in a day. The 
bodies are piled up in the square after evening service, and the 
numbers counted. 
The Cat is said to have become feral on the main island ; and 
on Eat Island and one or two of the other islands we saw a large 
black Cat which had escaped from an Italian vessel wrecked 
there, and which had run wild. 
In Amerigo Vespucci's account of the island above quoted, he 
mentions “ Mures quam maximi .” What these were we cannot 
now determine, but it is highly improbable that they were Mas 
rattus. 
A species of Dolphin was constantly seen in San Antonio Bay 
and also off Eat Island. One was captured during our visit; its 
stomach contained many cuttlefish and prawns, the latter very 
similar to the common edible prawn of Pernambuco. Whales 
also passed within sight of the island on one occasion, but we 
did not see them. 
A V E S. 
By E. Bowdler Sharpe, F.L.S., &c., 
Assistant in the Zoological Department, British Museum. 
The birds of the island are not very numerous as regards 
species, and apparently there are only three indigenous Land- 
birds. The species of Sea-birds found by Mr. Eidley are 
precisely what one might have looked for, but it is a little 
remarkable that no Petrel was observed. 
