NOTES AT AVIGNON, 175 
seemed always about the same, I have no doubt that it should be 
classed asa resident. That it spends the winter in some parts 
of France seems to be certain, and it is of course the fact that it 
not unfrequently does so even in Britain. On the 10th a young 
Englishman, attached to the Lycée as teacher of English, 
showed me a deserted nest with one Blackcap’s ege in it of the 
yellowish-brown type, built in a most conspicuous place close to 
a tennis-ground and a dusty high road. Two French boys who 
were with him did not seem to take much interest in it. The 
Avignonese do not seem devoted to natural history; their Museum, 
excellent in other ways, contains hardly any birds. I may just 
add that these Blackcaps would sing even in a violent Mistral, 
and that their song was of a slightly different type to that of 
our birds—less pure in tone, as I thought, and less sustained. 
A few Swallows were fighting their way up the river on the 
morning of the 2nd, and during my stay their numbers slowly 
increased; before I left some seemed to have reached their 
summer quarters here, for they were flying about one or two 
houses on the west side of the Rhone. I saw no House-Martins 
or Sand-Martins. In 1895 I met with these two species for the 
first time at Bordighera on April 13th and 14th. respectively. 
The Common Swift, which I did not see this year at all, was in 
the former year passing eastwards along the coast of the Riviera 
on April 14th at almost incredible speed. I saw it again at 
Milan on the 24th, and in Northern France on May Ist. 
On the 8rd I strolled to the southern end of the island, where 
the two branches of the river unite to form a truly magnificent 
stream. I saw nothing new except a party of Terns going 
northwards, and had (as often afterwards) to console myself with 
the butterflies, of which I will say a word when I have done with 
the birds. 
On the 4th we went to the historical town of Orange. Here, 
while I was examining the sculptures on the Roman arch through 
my binocular, I caught sight of a large Swift travelling north- 
wards, and as the glass was in position I was able to identify it 
as Cypselus melba by its white belly. In 1895 this fine bird was 
passing Avignon on the 8th. The next day I saw another party 
from the top of the amphitheatre at Nismes, and it would seem 
that this is its regular course of migration on its way to the 
