ORNITHOLOGY OF THE ISLAND OF TOBAGO. 
The West Indian Islands, as they are collectively called, now 
form an extensive archipelago, situate in that great hollow or bay 
opposite to the narrow land which at the present time connects 
the two American continents. Did these islands once form a part 
of the continental land ! Have the great convulsions which have 
agitated these countries cut them off from the ancient mainland! 
Have they been partially upraised, and have some new islands 
been entirely formed ? A French author tells us, that “ Tobago 
resembles the eastern part of Trinidad ; and every thing tends to 
declare, that Trinidad and Tobago were separated from the conti- 
nent by a sudden retreat of the waters of the sea ;” while on the 
other hand, the works of Darwin afford ample proofs of an uprais- 
ing, at a comparatively modern period, of many parts of the coast 
of South America. In either case it becomes extremely interesting 
to trace how these islands have become crowded with animal life, 
the relations which their species bear with those of the continent or 
the adjacent isles, and the changes that in a later era may have 
occurred in their individual fauna. Some of these islands are of 
very large extent, while others are of very limited bounds, but so 
far as our present information extends, they exhibit an ornithology 
sometimes quite distinct from each other, and in a few instances re- 
markably peculiar. Some serve as a refuge for the migratory species 
of the northern continent, and receive them ; some again have, as 
it Avere, only a partial share of the birds of South America ; but all 
our consignments have been so distinct, or as we have termed it, 
“ insulated,” that we consider any materials that will determine the 
species belonging to one member of the archipelago, or that will 
throAv light on their geographical distribution through the whole of 
it, will be of some service to ornithology. 
In lands that have been cut off from any great continent, we can 
understand the retention or carrying away of at least a proportion 
of their productions ; and in the distribution of species, birds are 
possessed of that peculiar locomotive power, which would, and 
which we know does, easily transport them much longer distances 
than the space which separates any of these islands from the main- 
land. “ We used to wonder” writes the Rev. Lansdown Gruilding, 
“ how those islands which owe their origin to volcanic convulsions, 
or have sprung from the bosom of the ocean, built on reefs ot 
corals, could become peopled with the countless animals which they 
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