Letters, Extracts, and Xotes. G19 



my separates will allow, to any ornithologist who cares to 

 send me his address ? 



Yours truly, 



49 Peterborough Road, Fulham, C. Davies Sherborn. 



London, S.W., 

 16th August, 1905. 



Sirs, — With the assistance of an intelligent and reliable 

 keeper, and from my own notes and recollection, I am able 

 to give the following instance of the procreative instinct of 

 the Great Crested Grebe, Podicipes cristatus (Linnaeus) : — 



Last year (1904) a pair of Great Crested Grebes nested 

 on a sheet of water in this neighbourhood and a clutch of 

 eggs was produced. These eggs, upon which the female 

 was sitting, disappeared — by what means was not discovered, 

 but it was not considered to be by human agency. Shortly 

 afterwards the female laid an egg on another nest, which 

 was deserted, and the egg vanished. On May 1st the same 

 year I saw the female sitting on a clutch of eggs on the third 

 nest of the season. A heavy gale the following day blew 

 away this nest and the eggs, and on May 19th the same 

 year I observed the female sitting on eggs on another (the 

 fourth) nest, from which a brood ultimately resulted. The 

 pair of birds in question were the only Great Crested Grebes 

 on the water last year until about May 12th, when they 

 were joined by another pair; and the one pair were the 

 owners of all four nests. 



My own experience was that if the first clutch of eggs of 

 this Grebe are destroyed or taken a second nest is soon after- 

 wards constructed and other eggs laid; but I was not aware 

 that four nests, each containing an egg or eggs, would, 

 under any circumstances, be produced in one season by this 

 bird — a one-brooded species. 



On April 16th this year (1905) I inspected a Great 

 Crested Grebe's nest, on the same sheet of water, which con- 

 tained five eggs in an advanced state of incubation, and they 

 very soon afterwards hatched out. 



There were two pairs of Great Crested Grebes on the 



