PASSING NOTES 
ON 
THE BIRDS OF ITALY. 
ON the 30th of December, 1874, I was ensconced in a 
railway carriage between Macon and Turin. We kept 
passing continually rivers—affluents I suppose of the Rhone, 
and at one place the waters swelled into a majestic lake. 
Here I saw several hundred Ducks, all of which were gone 
when I traversed the margin of the lake again in the 
summer. Some which were nearer than the rest, I could 
see to be common Wild Ducks. 
Shortly before entering the famed tunnel of Mount 
Cenis, which took us twenty-five minutes to pass through, 
my attention was directed to some flocks of Alpine Choughs, 
looking exactly like Jackdaws, which I thought they were, 
until one came near enough for me to see its yellow bill. 
I will now say something about the Natural History of 
Turin, which Bradshaw describes asa brand new city. Soit 
is, and a very good one; capital shops and good hotels, 
The completion and opening of a new arcade was celebrated 
while I was there, to be called the “Galleria subalpina.” 
Perhaps I cannot give a better idea of its avifauna than by 
a list of the birds in the market. 
