444 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



never saw a brighter green than that of the tiny meadows and 

 clearings. The people were still putting in some barley, but some 

 was up, and about three inches high on the 18th. The woods, 

 however, were still encumbered with snow-drifts. But the snow 

 was melting fast on the surrounding mountains, and torrents 

 roared all around in the mountains of Kvalo and the mainland. 



We enjoyed some lovely hot sunny days, and by the time we 

 left, on the 23rd, the beautiful short arctic summer had come. 

 Cow-bells tinkled all about the pastures and drier bogs and the 

 low woods. The people at the little farms sat outside, sewing, in 

 the warm still afternoons, and wild flowers were everywhere 

 coming into bloom. We found the Globe-flower (Trollius 

 europceus), Andromeda, Pyrola, Primula far inosa, a bright yellow 

 Viola, and many other showy species, and the air was sweet with 

 the honeyed scent of the catkins of shiny-leaved and downy-leaved 

 willows. In its wonderful fresh greenness of early summer, the 

 island presented a lovely scene, belted with a narrow ribbon of 

 fjord, and hemmed in by jagged, rugged, snowy mountains. On 

 the 22nd a small dusky Pieris was on the wing, and Erebia 

 (Maniola) manto was very plentiful. 



The various species of woodland birds breed, for the most 

 part, together in colonies. These are found near the edge of the 

 woods. When you get deep into the woods, you see hardly any 

 birds ; a few Willow Wrens in the more open spaces, perhaps, 

 and here and there a pair of Fieldfares or Bramblings (but these 

 are seldom quite in the deepest parts of the woods), and very 

 occasionally a Grey Crow, attracted probably by the loud cries of 

 the Fieldfares. But on the outskirts of the birch-woods Field- 

 fares are common, and we used to find several nests in every walk 

 we took; the birds were tame and noisy. Bramblings also were 

 abundant, and Mealy Redpolls. 



We visited the island of Grindo in the fjord, to the S.W., 

 about two hours' row from the town of Tromso. It is a low 

 green island of a few hundred acres in extent, with some pastures 

 round the eastern shores, and rising a little inland, where it is 

 partly covered with birch-wood and partly with bog and semi-bog. 

 Some crowberry covered the hillocks, and there was a fine growth 

 of cloudberry in full bloom. Some low bluffs on the west side 

 grown with Empetrum nigrum, Vaccinium uliginosum, &c, are 

 favourite haunts of the Eiders in the breeding season. 



