106 



Mr. A. B. Brooke saw a fine adult female that was killed at Coronata, near Genoa, on the 22nd 

 of June, 1871, and is now in the Museo Civico of that city ; and this gentleman, to whom we 

 are indebted for the loan of several specimens, also observed it in Sardinia, and sends us the 

 following notes respecting it : — " ' Toro ' and ' Vacca,' two barren uninhabited twin rocks rising 

 precipitously out of the sea off the south-west corner of Sardinia, form, perhaps, the principal 

 headquarters of these beautiful Falcons in tbe Mediterranean. 'Vacca' (which I visited) lies 

 eight miles from the Sardinian coast, being two miles south of the small thinly inhabited island 

 of S. Antioco. Its length is about a quarter of a mile, its breadth not quite so much. ' Toro ' 

 is, I believe, rather the larger island of the two, and is situated seven or eight miles further 

 south. Owing to the extreme difficulty of landing, except during the calmest weather, these 

 islands are seldom visited, and that only by fishermen, who occasionally land to dry their nets. 

 Amongst the precipitous cliffs of ' Vacca,' especially those on the east side of the rock, are the 

 favourite haunts of the Eleonora Falcons, where they pass the entire year and breed. It was 

 early in May when I explored these cliffs; and although this Falcon is supposed not to breed 

 until much later in the year, yet I feel almost certain that they were nesting at the time of my 

 visit. If this be not so, I do not know how to account for the large number of birds (about 

 twenty or twenty-five pairs) that I found continually on the rock during the day-time, persistently 

 returning, and flying into the same holes, and that after having been fired at and wounded, as 

 was the case with many individuals. The manner in which they flew in circles, screaming, over 

 my head, exhibited a similar annoyance to that displayed by Peregrines when their nests are 

 disturbed. I also fancied several times I heard the young birds squealing in their nests. I 

 tried unsuccessfully to make this certain by reaching the breeding-holes, but found that it was 

 absolutely impossible, without proper ropes and tackle necessary for such an undertaking. On 

 the top of the cliffs I found numerous chosen places where the Falcons picked their prey 

 previous to carrying them down to their young. The remnants consisted solely of the remains 

 of Insessores, which must have been obtained on the opposite shores of Sardinia, as the only 

 species observed by me on Vacca was the Common Wheatear, of which I saw a solitary pair. 

 The stomachs of all the Eleonora Falcons examined by me contained the remains of small birds. 

 Two old males that I obtained were in their beautiful adult, dark, slaty blue plumage. A third, 

 a young male probably of the previous year, differed from adult females in the much darker 

 colour of his breast, and also in the colour of his feet, which were of a decided orange-yellow, 

 instead of the pale yellow tinged with green characteristic of the old female bird. The wings 

 of four specimens as they lay before me in the flesh reached almost exactly level with the end of 

 their tails, not extending beyond." 



Mr. Howard Saunders when at Eome found nailed to a barn-door the dried remains of a 

 bird of this species which, from its size, he judged to be a female ; and Lord Lilford informs us 

 that he believes he saw specimens of this Falcon off Sicily in August 1858, and on the west coast 

 of Corfu in the summer of 1857. According to Canon Tristram, as stated in Mr. Wright's list of 

 birds of Malta and Gozo, Colonel Drummond Hay shot one in Malta, this specimen being now in 

 the colonel's collection. Most of the specimens which have lately found their way into collections 

 appear to have come from the islands of Greece through that indefatigable collector Dr. Th. 

 Kriiper, whose notes on the habits and nidification of this species we translate below. Until he 



