INTRODUCTION. 
take tlieir flight southward and return to Senegal 
after a temporary residence on the plains of Southern 
Africa. This fact was conjectured by Le Vaillant, 
and it is fully confirmed by our own investigations, 
drawn from the specimens that have been recently 
imported from Senegal and Senegambia. Hitherto 
this fact only regards the splendid genus Lampro- 
tornis, which may be called the African starlings ; 
but future information will, no doubt, shew us that 
a southern migration takes place in other instances. 
It may he questioned, however, whether any of the 
Senegal birds go northward, excepting those more 
peculiar to the banks of the Gambia, which are 
likewise found in Britain, and the two or three 
species of perchers, formerly noticed as extending 
to Northern Africa and Central Europe*. Adanson 
asserts that our house-swallow is the same as that 
of Senegal ; but we have no means of judging the 
accuracy of the statement. 
The first peculiarity that strikes us in contem- 
plating the ornithology of Senegal, is the great pre- 
ponderance of richly coloured buds. Now this 
circumstance may be accounted for in two ways. 
Either it is the result of commercial speculation 
among the dealers, who imagine that such birds 
will find a better market in Europe than those of a 
more homely plumage ; or it is a real peculiarity, 
and therefore arising from natural laws. We believe 
this latter to be the true reason. In the following 
pages we shall have to describe a very considerable 
* Merops Europteus. 
