Page:The Zoologist, 3rd series, vol 1 (1877).djvu/410

384 the 12th August. I saw a pair of these birds here last summer. They were nesting in the crevice of a rock on a hill-side covered with heath, at an elevation of about 800 feet above sea-level, and brought out their young. The keeper had observed a pair of pigeons every year in the same quarter, breeding, and reported them to me, but until now did not succeed in shooting a specimen, and neither he nor I could get near enough to determine whether they' were Blue Rocks or Stock Doves. Taking this report in connection with the first known occurrence of the species in Ireland in October, 1875, in the County of Down, which I had the honour to report to ' The Zoologist' soon after (February, 1876, p. 4798), and with another in the same county last June, which I believe Mr. Darragh, of Belfast, has already communicated to you, it does appear probable that the extension of the Stock Dove northward in England within the last ten years, as chronicled in the columns of 'The Zoologist,' has led to its further extension across the narrow channel, to the north-eastern parts of this island.— (Ravensdale Park, Newry).

[The occurrence of the Stock Dove in Ireland is very noteworthy, as until within the last three years it was quite unknown there. A specimen was shot last year in the Co. Down, and presented by Mr. A. O'D. Taylor to the Belfast Museum. During the present summer, as we learn from Mr. Darragh, a pair bred near Comber, in the same county, and a young one, shot after it had left the nest, was obtained by him also for the Belfast Museum.—.]

—On the 15th May last, as ray brother and I were taking a walk in the fields near Wilsden, we observed a Whinchat, Saxicola rubetra, fly from a wall into an oak tree a little in advance of us. When within about forty yards from the tree we sat down, and my brother called my attention to its singing. To my surprise, it was imitating the song of other birds. During the short time we listened, it imitated in quick succession the song of the Wren, Song Thrush, Chaffinch, Corn Bunting, Tree Lark, Greenfinch, and Starling so successfully that the most practised ear could scarcely have detected the difference. I remarked it again on May 17th; but a swollen stream separating me from the whitethorn in which it was singing, I heard it to great disadvantage. I could hear, however, a few strains which resembled the song of a Linnet, the two shrill call-notes of the Yellow Wagtail, and a note, which it kept repeating, very much after the manner of a Cole Tit. There was no mistake as to the identity of the species in question.— (Wilsden, near Bradford).

—With reference to the Cormorant of unusual plumage, referred to in 'The Zoologist' for July (p. 280), as seen by Mr. Gatcombe at Wembury, and the same or a similar one by Mr. Clogg on the Cornish coast, I think it probable I saw the bird