THE NIGHTJAR. 423 



on the tail of one, — said to denote the male bird, — were quite con- 

 spicuous in the twilight. On the following evening we saw 

 another between Innisfallen and Ross Island. 



Dr. J. L. Drummond informs me, that when H.M.S. San Juan 

 (of which he was surgeon) was anchored near Gibraltar, in the 

 spring of the year, a few nightjars flew on board. During the 

 passage of H.M.S. Beacon, from Malta to the Morea, in April, 

 1841, some of these birds appeared on the 27th about the ship 

 and alighted. We were then about 50 miles from Zante (the 

 nearest land) and 60 west of the Morea. They came singly, with 

 one exception, when two appeared in company. A couple of 

 them were shot in the afternoon. A few others had been seen 

 about the vessel on the two or three days preceding. On the 

 evening of the 1st of June, two were killed, and others seen, in the 

 once celebrated but now barren and uninhabited island of Delos. 



White, in his History of Selborne, gives an extremely interest- 

 ing account of the nightjar ; Sir Wm. Jardine very fully notes 

 its various modes of flight; in Macgillivray's British Birds, an 

 ample description appears from the author, to which are added 

 valuable contributions from Mr. Harley and Mr. Weir; the ob- 

 servations of the former having been made near Leicester ; those 

 of the latter at Bathgate, Linlithgowshire. The species has com- 

 monly been seen by a sporting friend, about the wooded banks of 

 the river Stinchar, in Ayrshire. 



Note to p. 206. Blue Tit, Parus coeruleus. — Since the account of this bird was 

 printed off, a very beautiful variety, worthy of especial notice, has been ldndly 

 brought to Belfast for my examination, by the Rev. G. Robinson of Tandragee. It 

 was shot in a wild state in the county of Armagh, in company with others of its 

 species. It does not retain any of the ordinary colour. The entire under surface 

 and the back, are of the richest canary yellow, with which the upper portion of the 

 wings also, is partially tinged. The tail is pure white. The few first quills are white, 

 the succeeding ones pearl-grey, but of a darker shade at the tips. The head is singu- 

 larly parti-coloured with white, blue, greyish -brown, and canary-yellow. Bill, legs, 

 and feet, of a whitish hue. 



