NATURAL HISTORY OF THE BERMUDAS. 51 



Lieutenant Wedderburn in Hamilton Harbour this even- 

 ing. Its measurement the same as that of the fellow- 

 bird shot on the 18th instant. The plumage, of the same 

 grey colour, though perhaps rather more mottled with 

 white. This is the third Larus occidentalis recently shot 

 here, and the last, I rather think, of the few which have 

 been observed about this part of the Bermudas. 



A Blue Heron (Ardea herodias) and a few Turnstones 

 were also met with by Mr. Wedderburn during the day. 



Yarrell, the author of " British Ornithology " — to whom the 

 tail feathers of the Bermuda-killed specimen of the Common 

 Wheat-ear were sent — has addressed a letter of thanks to 

 the Rev. H. B. Tristram, and expressed his intention of 

 publishing the circumstance in the next edition of his 

 work — at the same time observing that on reference to his 

 description of the Wheat-ear, a greater western range than 

 Bermuda has been given to that bird. This is true; for 

 the Wheat-ear not only visits the Ferroe Islands and Ice- 

 land, but has been observed by Captain Sabine in the 

 month of October, off Cape Farewell, Greenland, and in 

 May, in latitude 6o° N., longitude 13 W. Captain Ross 

 also mentions a solitary instance of one of these birds 

 flying round his ship, in Felix Harbour, 70° N., 91° 53' 

 W. longitude, on May 2nd, 1830, which was found dead 

 alongside the following morning — the longitude of Bermuda 

 being 64° 51' W. only. 



Now, supposing Captain Ross' specimen to have taken 

 its departure from the coast of Scotland or Norway, resting 

 at the Ferroe Islands, then making Iceland its next stage, 

 and so on to the eastern coast of Greenland, from thence 

 crossing the country to the narrowest part of Davis Strait, 

 and onward to Felix Harbour, and allowing this Wheat-ear 

 to fly at the rate of forty miles an hour only, it would per- 



