84 DESERT TRUMPETER BULLFINCH. 



green colour in which they appear to travellers who pass 

 these land-marks of navigation in the height of summer. 



The Desert Trumpeter is found most plentifully in 

 Lanzarote and Fuertaventura, and most sparingly in the 

 great Canary Island. I found it in fact spread over 

 the whole eastern part of the Canary Islands, and have 

 reason to believe that it may inhabit the more western 

 parts also. 



On the 1st. of April, 1856, I found it in an excursion 

 to Caldeca von Bandama, on the high-road which leads 

 from Ciudad de las Palmas to the Yegas, and welcomed 

 it joyfully as an old acquaintance one comes upon un- 

 expectedly. It is seen, but less plentifully, in the neigh- 

 bourhood of the principal town, but at the time of 

 migration it appears in great numbers in the harbour, 

 Puerta de la Luz. I have also observed it in the 

 districts of Jinamar, Carrizal, and Juan Grande, and 

 nowhere more abundantly than in Arguineguin, where 

 it frequents in flocks the tombs and ruins of a town 

 which at one time had been plundered by the Spaniards, 

 which now covers a cape or promontory with rocks and 

 grottoes, and fig-trees in the back ground, and com- 

 mands an incomparable panorama over the sea towards 

 the peak of Teneriffe. 



It also breeds in the islands of the western group, 

 since the thick growth of wood has driven it back 

 there, but it has not been seen hitherto on Teneriffe, 

 Gomera, Palma, or Ferro." 



"The country inhabited by the Desert Trumpeter 

 must above all things be without trees, and in the hot 

 regions' of the sunny coast. It prefers stony places, 

 where in the noon-day the wind trembles over burning 

 stones, and by the glimmer and reflected light of which 

 the traveller is almost blinded. Only a little grass grows 



