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Show 306 MR. P. L. SCLATER ON CICONIA BOYCIANA. [May 19, healthiness. These islands, which are of volcanic origin, have an excellent soil, composed chiefly of decomposed lava and vegetable matter. They are mostly covered with wood; but there are some natural savannas, and a few clear spaces, affording ample pasturage for innumerable elephants, deer, buffaloes, and other wild animals. The inhabitants cultivate some maize, and have plantations of bananas and palms ; but their chief wealth consists of cattle and goats. It is remarkable that the hippopotamus is found in the straits which divide the islands of Canyabac and Bulama from the continent; there is no freshwater river within several miles." * The avifauna of Bulama is, as might have been expected, thoroughly Senegambian, as far as we can judge from so small a collection as the present. The nearest point of Africa, Bissao, has been thoroughly explored by M . Beaudouin and other French naturalists; but I am not aware that any connected account of their collections has ever been published. 1. Asturinula monogrammica. 2. Coracias abyssinica. 3. Merops"agyptius. 4. Corythornis cyanostigma. 5. Schizorhis africana. 6. Nectarinia cyanocephala. 7'. Nectarinia cuprea. 8. Nectarinia subcollaris. 9. Laniarius barbarus. 10. Laniarius bakbakiri. The collection contains a specimen of Laniarius bakbakiri, apparently identical with South-African examples. This is the first time that this species has been known to occur in West Africa ; and I was inclined to doubt its Bulama origin. Major Bulger, however, believes that it was collected with the other birds, but has kindly promised to inquire into the matter on his brother's return. May 19, 1874. Dr. E. Hamilton, V.P., in the Chair. Mr. Sclater exhibited a skin of Ciconia boyciana, Swinhoe (P. Z.S. 1873, p. 513, and 1874, p. 2, PI. I.), being that of one of the two specimens recently living in the Gardens f, and stated that he had received a communication from M . L. Taczanowski of Warsaw, C.M.Z.S., from which it would appear that this species was the ordinary White Stork of Eastern Siberia. The following was an extract from M . Taczanowski's letter. After stating that M . Severtzow had * Life of Capt. Beaver by Smyth ; and Capt. Belcher in the Journ. of the Geogr. Soc. t This specimen is now in Lord Walden's collection. 11. Terpsiphone nigriceps. 12. Pholidauges leucogaster. 13. Euplectes flammiceps. 14. Coliostruthus macrurus. 15. Hyphantornis luteolus. 16. Spermestes bicolor. 17. Estrelda rufopicta. 18. Treron calva. 19. Turtur erythrophrys. |