_Comparison of the Bird-faunas of Bermuda and the Azores._--The bird-fauna of Bermuda thus differs from that of the Azores, in the much smaller number of resident species, and the presence of several regular migrants. This is due, first, to the small area and little varied surface of these islands, as well as to their limited flora and small supply of insects not affording conditions suitable for the residence of many species all the year round; and, secondly, to the peculiarity of the climate of North America, which causes a much larger number of its birds to be migratory than in Europe. The Northern United States and Canada, with a sunny climate, luxuriant vegetation, and abundant insect-life during the summer, supply food and shelter to an immense number of insectivorous and frugivorous birds; so that during the breeding season Canada is actually richer in bird-life than Florida. But as the severe winter comes on all these are obliged to migrate southward, some to Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, others as far as the West Indies, Mexico, or even to Guatemala and South America. Every spring and autumn, therefore a vast multitude of birds, belonging to more than a hundred distinct species, migrate northward or southward in Eastern America. A large proportion of these pass along the Atlantic coast, and it has been observed that many of them fly some distance out to sea, passing straight across bays from headland to headland by the shortest route. Now as the time of these migrations is the season of storms, especially the autumnal one, which nearly coincides with the hurricanes of the West Indies and the northerly gales of the coast of America, the migrating birds are very liable to be carried out to sea. Sometimes they may, as Mr. Jones suggests, be carried up by local whirlwinds to a great height, where meeting with a westerly or north-westerly gale, they are rapidly driven sea-ward. The great majority no doubt perish, but some reach the Bermudas {269} and form one of its most striking autumnal features. In October, Mr. Jones tells us, the sportsman enjoys more shooting than at any other time. The violent revolving gales, which occur almost weekly, bring numbers of birds of many species from the American continent, the different members of the duck tribe forming no inconsiderable portion of the whole; while the Canada goose, and even the ponderous American swan, have been seen amidst the migratory host. With these come also such delicate birds as the American robin (_Turdus migratorius_), the yellow-rumped warbler (_Dendroeca coronata_), the pine warbler (_Dendroeca pinus_), the wood wagtail (_Siurus novaeboracensis_), the summer red bird (_Pyranga aestiva_), the snow-bunting (_Plectrophanes nivalis_), the red-poll (_Aegiothus linarius_), the king bird (_Tyrannus carolinensis_), and many others. It is no doubt in consequence of this repeated immigration that none of the Bermuda birds have acquired any special peculiarity