60 falconidjE. 



and the martins {Hirunclo urbica) had been more numerous on 

 that day at Wolf-hill, than at any time during the season. 



Notwithstanding the numbers of these birds bred at Walton 

 Hall, we are told that " during the winter there is scarcely a 

 wind-hover to be found" there. Such, also, is said to be the 

 case in the eastern parts of Mid Lothian ;* but Mr. Macgillivray 

 remarks, that in the districts bordering the Frith of Forth, they 

 are as numerous, perhaps even more so, in winter than in summer, 

 adding, that probably, " like the merlin, this species merely mi- 

 grates from the interior to the coast." In the north of Ireland 

 generally, kestrels seem to be quite as numerous in winter as in 

 summer, in their usual haunts. 



I have observed this species to be not uncommon in Switzer- 

 land and Italy. The first winch was seen, on our proceeding in 

 H.M.S. Beacon from Malta to the Morea, at the end of April, 

 1841, was a single individual, which flew close past the vessel 

 when sixty miles west of the Morea, and forty-five distant from 

 Zante, the nearest land. We saw the kestrel about Navarino at 

 the period just mentioned, and in the month of June met with it 

 at the cliffs of an islet north-east of Port Naussa, in Paros, where 

 it was believed to have an eyrie. When Dr. J. L. Drummond 

 was, many years ago, in the Renown (74 gun ship), off Toulon, 

 some hundreds of male kestrels, on their way from the south, 

 alighted, quite exhausted, on the rigging, and so many were caught 

 by the sailors, that for some time there was hardly a berth with- 

 out its kestrel. The weather was moderate at the time. My 

 friend kept one of them alive for several weeks by feeding it on 

 salt meat, steeped for some time in fresh water. But none of 

 the birds lived long, in consequence of no fresh food being obtain- 

 able for them. 



The Little Kestrel, Falco tbmunculoides. — In a review which 

 appeared in the Magazine of Zoology and Botany (vol. ii. p. 352), of 

 the French Scientific Expedition to the Morea, the writer states that 

 he had long been aware of this bird being common in Greece ; that it 



* Mr. Hepburn in Macg. Brit. Birds, vol. iii. p. 334. 



