64 BIRDS OF NOEFOLK. 



Whetlier or not the female ever attains the same plumage 

 as the adult m.ale, as asserted by some naturalists, un- 

 doubtedly the hen bird, in her mottled dress, pairs with 

 the mature male. 



LANIUS RUTILUS, Latham. 

 WOODCHAT SHRIKE. 



Mr. Hunt, in his " List of Norfolk Birds," has the 

 following note on the Woodchat : — " Mr. Scales assures 

 me that he has killed this rare species in the neighbour- 

 hood of Beechamwell, where he has known it to breed 

 and rear its young." This statement, except on the 

 authority of two good naturahsts, might almost have 

 been questioned from the rarity of this bird, and its 

 occurrence only at uncertain intervals, as a merely acci- 

 dental visitant, since, with the above exception, I know of 

 only two authentic instances in which specimens of this 

 shrike have been obtained in Norfolk. Mr. Lubbock has 

 recorded one, as killed near Swaffham some years ago, 

 said to have been in Mr. Hamond's collection, and 

 on the 29th of April, 1859, a male woodchat, now 

 in the possession of Mr. J. H. Gurney, was killed at 

 Yarmouth. This bird had nearly completed its spring 

 moult, but from the appearance of some unmature 

 feathers still remaining, had probably but just attained 

 its adult plumage. The chesnut patch on the back of 

 neck, and the tints of the back and wings, were some- 

 what lighter than in older specimens. On the 2nd of 

 May, however, of the same year in which the Yarmouth 

 example was obtained, an adult male was shot in the 

 adjoining county of Suffolk, at Lound, near Lowestoft ; 

 and Mr. T. M. Spalding, of Westleton, has a fine old 

 male, killed by himself in Lord Stradbroke's park (Hen- 



