Page:The Zoologist, 3rd series, vol 2 (1878).djvu/81

Rh the Brent Goose come out of the osier-bed; another then appeared, and he watched the pair for some time. They were very tame. Bennett is a well-known gunner here. He keeps a shooting-punt with a punt-gun, the only one on the river. As he had just started for a trip on the Monday, he was surprised to see a strange bird get up and fly into the osier-bed; he then approached in the boat and shot it. I am told that the other was then at Great Barford, a few miles down the river. The second instance, of course, is not near so important as the first, where the bird was actually obtained. The birdstuffer also brought me a Willow Wren, which had evidently been but a short time set up. He assured me that it was brought to him in the flesh on the 21st December.— (Bedford).

—With regard to this subject, noted in 'The Zoologist' by the Rev. Murray A. Mathew, my brother, and Mr. Leach, I may remark that in this district, where Corn Crakes were at one time considered common, I never once during the past year (though out constantly) heard the familiar note or knew of a nest being found. The only example of the species that I met with, I killed when shooting in the New Forest on October 18th.— (Hounsdown, Totton, Hants).

—I can confirm the experience of other observers as to the scarcity of the Corn Crake in various parts of the country during the summer and autumn of 1877. During the month of September I was shooting over about 3000 acres in Essex, and although I walked over some very likely ground, with here and there a good bit of clover-seed, I never saw a single Corn Crake. Similarly, when shooting, during the last week of September, in Suffolk, near Saxmundham, over good partridge-ground, where the bag was never less than fifteen brace of birds a-day, besides rabbits and hares, not a single Bail was flushed, notwithstanding the repeated attempts of three good spaniels to find one. In Sussex and Hampshire in former years I have sometimes shot five or six in a day, and in Middlesex at one time this bird was one of the commonest of our summer migrants, its incessant "crake, crake," during the months of May and June, being heard all day long, and very frequently far into the night.—.

—When shooting near Bedford, on the 24th December last, I was surprised to see a small flock of Dunlins flying past. I killed one of them, which came rather nearer to me than the rest, and thought at the time it was but a migratory movement. I observed them again, however, on the 31st, and am told that they have been some time in the vicinity. On dissection of the specimen killed, it appeared that the stomach was quite full of river or brook slime, mixed with