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Show 264 MR. P. L. SCLATER ON THE BIRDS OF SANTA LUCIA. [Mar. 21, 1. The Virgin Islands.-Of these islands we may, I think, assume that we have a fair acquaintance with the birds of St. Thomas,^ the most frequently visited of the group, and the halting-place of the West-Indian Mail-steamers. Mr. Riise, who was long resident here, collected and forwarded to Europe many specimens, some of which were described by myself*, and others are spoken of by Prof. Newton in a letter published in 'The Ibis' for 1860, p. 307. Mr. Riise's series of skins is now, I believe, at Copenhagen. Frequent allusions to the birds of St. Thomas are also made by Messrs. Newton in their memoir of the birds of St. Croix, mentioned below. In the 'Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia' for 1860 (p. 374), Mr. Cassin has given an account of a collection of birds made in St. Thomas by Mr. Robert Swift, aud presented to the Academy ; twenty-seven species are enumerated. Quite at the extreme east of the Virgin Islands, and lying between them and the St. Bartholomew group, is the little islet of Sombrero, " a naked rock about seven eighths of a mile long, twenty to forty feet above the level of the sea, and from a iew rods to about one third of a mile in width." Although "there is no vegetation whatever in the island over two feet high," and it would seem a most unlikely place for birds, Mr. A. A. Julien, a correspondent of Mr. Lawrence of New York, succeeded in collecting on it specimens of no less than thirty-five species, the names of which, together with Mr. Julien's notes thereupon, are recorded by Mr. Lawrence in the eighth volume of the 'Annals of the Lyceum of Natural History of New York' (p. 92). The remaining islands of the Virgin group are, I believe, most strictly entitled to their name so far as ornithology is concerned, for no collector on record has ever polluted their virgin soil. Prof. Newton (Ibis, 1860, p. 307) just alludes to some birds from St. John in the possession of Mr. Riise. 2. St. Croix.-On the birds of this island we have an excellent article by Messrs. A. and E. Newton, published in the first volume of 'The Ibis't- This memoir, being founded on the collections and personal observations of the distinguished authors themselves, and having been worked up after a careful examination of their specimens in England, and with minute attention to preceding authorities, forms by far the most complete account we possess of the ornithology of any one of the Lesser Antilles. It, however, of course requires to be supplemented by additional observations, many points having been necessarily left undetermined; and it is much to be regretted that no one seems to have since paid the slightest attention to the subject. 3. Anguilla, St. Martin, and St. Bartholomew.-Of this group of islands St. Bartholomew alone has, as far as I know, been explored ornithologically, and that within a very recent period. In the Royal Swedish Academy's 'Proceedings' for 1869 will be found an excel- * Ann. N. H. ser. 3, vol. iv. p. 225; and P. Z. S. 1860, p. 314. t Ibis. 1859, pp. 59, 138, 252, and 365. |
