illustrations of foreign oology. 
feeding Within gun-shot of each other. During the period of incu- 
bation they are remarkably fearless, coming within a few yards of 
a boat, or close along side one while bathing, even within a yard of 
? 16a ‘ ; "® r , do tbe - Y conceal their nests or young, as they fly 
backwards and forwards, regardless of the presence of a spectator- 
t hey breed on all parts of the coasts of the Bermudas, but 
C " efly 011 the sout hern side, where the cliffs are most precipitous 
and inaccessible. They form no nest, but deposit their single egg 
on the bare rock, upon a ledge seldom more than one or two feet 
within the face of the cliff, sometimes about fifteen feet above the 
level of the sea, but more frequently at a much greater elevation. 
Both the parent birds, I believe, take a share in the labour of in- 
cubation, but of this I am not quite certain ; I have often observed 
both feeding the young at the ledge of the rock, clinging to its 
side much after the fashion of a Swift. While sitting, they will 
allow any one to take them in their hands rather than leave then- 
egg. In proof of this, on one occasion, I had requested some 
soldiers, stationed at an outpost near one of their favourite haunts, 
to procure me a few living specimens and some eggs. Two or 
three days afterwards, I was shocked to find that they had taken 
upwards of fifty of the poor creatures on their nests, and shut them 
up in a dark cellar, waiting my arrival ! We immediately relieved 
the greater part of them, but more than twenty had perished during 
their night’s confinement in this “ black hole.” A few such razzias 
as this, and the whole colony might have been extirpated. The 
first plumage of the nestling is a pure white down, afterwards 
the broad bars of black are more broadly marked than in the 
adult. The eggs in my possession vary much, generally of a uni- 
form brownish-red mottled colour, most like the usual colour of 
those of a Kestrel but browner. Some are only reddish-white, and 
aie darkly marked at the thick end and very pale at the small end. 
-^fiuy generally withdraw to the southward in September. I 
observed a few in October, 1847, and one or two in November, 
1848. During the winter months, I have never heard of a single 
straggler. Unlike the Laridce, the Phaeihon never flies over the 
land, or comes up the creeks where there are no cliffs for nidifica- 
tion ; nor have I ever seen one settle, except on the ledges, where 
their young might bo directly overhanging the deep sea,.” 
