NIGHTINGALE. 49 



considerably further north of the ancient city referred to. 

 This led to the supposition that this species may be regarded as 

 one of those which has gradually extended its range north- 

 ward in the county during the past hundred years. Further 

 research, however, into Yorkshire ornithology made known 

 that such has really not been the case, as may be gathered 

 from the statement, made at least a century ago, of Marmaduke 

 Tunstall, F.R.S. — a Yorkshire naturalist and one of the 

 best ornithologists of his day — which appears for some not 

 easily explainable reason to have escaped notice. Writing to 

 Dr. Latham, presumably about the year 1783, Tunstall 

 remarked that " The Nightingale is never heard or seen here 

 [Wycliffe-on-the-Tees]. It is frequently heard near Borough- 

 bridge* about 37 miles farther south ; and a few miles farther, 

 near Abberford, particularly at Hazlewood, the seat of Sir 

 Walter Vavasour, is extremely lavish in song. ..." This 

 statement of Tunstall's is true to-day, for the Rev. E. P. 

 Knubley, M.A., late rector of Staveley, near Boroughbridge, 

 stated that a pair nested in Gibbet Wood, two miles from 

 Staveley, in 1870 ; that in 1881 a pair nested and reared 

 its young in his rectory garden ; and that he was told on 

 reliable authority that a pair nested in Loftus Fox Cover 

 in the parish, a mile from his house, in 1883. Boroughbridge, 

 it may be remarked, is ten miles north of the latitude of York, 

 and lies sixteen miles north-west of that city. 



In occasional instances, however, it has been known to 

 visit during recent years slightly more hyperborean districts, 

 but it is possible, and even probable, that these exceptional 

 visits were also made in the far past, when, as it is important 

 to remember, ornithology was not the popular study it now is, 

 and when, too, there did not exist the numerous natural 

 history journals wherein to record observations and hand 

 down to us much information which would now be invaluable, 

 and enable us to make more just comparisons between our 

 present knowledge and that of the past. 



* The italics are ours. 

 VOL. I. E 



