I 4 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



harbour. A high west wind, which was blowing at the time, made 

 the day very unpropitious for a close examination of the rocks, and 

 we were not fortunate enough to see a Chough, but one man, whom 

 we met near the old camps, informed us that one had been running 

 about upon the grass at the top of the cliff, within fifty yards of him, 

 not ten minutes before our arrival ! 



Anything more definite than this I have been unable to obtain, 

 either then or during several subsequent visits, and so, for the present, 

 the question must remain an open one, but it seems scarcely right to 

 omit all reference to it here ; and, as we were informed by the fisher- 

 men that we were not the only persons who had been making similar 

 inquiries of them, it is possible that some one may have been more 

 fortunate in his quest after the Choughs than we were, and may, 

 perhaps, be in a position to throw a little more light upon the matter. 



A person named Penman, a signal-man upon the railway between 

 Spittal and Scremerston, and who used to stuff birds a little, and take 

 considerable interest in them, told me of one, which had been picked 

 up by his wife, upon the sea-beach near his house, in September 

 1884, which was quite strange to him, but which, from his very 

 graphic description of it, could really be nothing else than a Chough. 

 The weather for some days previously had been very stormy, and 

 the bird had been so much damaged, and knocked about, by the 

 waves, that it was, unfortunately, not preserved ; but neither the man, 

 nor his wife, had any previous knowledge of the existence of such a 

 bird as the Chough, and I am quite sure that there was no intention 

 to mislead. 



When the Berwickshire Naturalists Club visited The Glen, the 

 seat of Mr. Edward Tennant, in Peeblesshire, in 1881, there was, 

 amongst the collection of birds in the house, a specimen of the 

 Chough, which Dr. Hardy elicited had been " shot by a ploughman 

 somewhere in the vicinity " (" Hist. Berw. Nat. Club," vol. ix. p. 488). 



JAY, Garrulus glandarius (Linnasus). Still manages to maintain 

 a footing in central Northumberland, where a few pairs breed oc- 

 casionally. A friend, who is well acquainted with this species, in 

 the county of Durham, informed me that he had seen one, during 

 the protracted snowstorm of December and January 1890-91, at 

 New Water Haugh, near Berwick. This is the only occurrence 

 hereabouts within recent times. 



MAGPIE, Pica rustica (Scopoli). Fairly plentiful to the south of 

 the borough, and nests regularly within a short distance of our 

 boundary ; much more uncommon on the north side of the Tweed. 

 I saw one shot, near New Water Haugh, on 2nd October 1878. 



The Magpie is one of the best checks we have upon the increase of 

 the Wood Pigeon, being very attentive to the nests of those birds in the 

 woods where it breeds. 



(To be continued?) 



