HAWFINCH. 215 



weather in January, 1823, is noticed by the Messrs. 

 Paget, and is also referred to in Sir Wm. Hooker's 

 MS., and in 1855 a considerable number aj^peared in 

 tliis neig'libourliood ; but probably the largest quantity 

 ever known to have visited this coast, occurred during 

 the long and severe winter of 1859-60. Between the 

 first week in December and the first week in April 

 of the ensuing year, upwards of forty specimens were 

 brought to one bird-j^reserver in this city, of which 

 nearly half were obtained in the neighboui'hood of East 

 Carlton and Ketteringham. A large flight also alighted, 

 about the same time, in a very exhausted state, in the 

 gardens near the denes at Yarmouth. 



In 1856, a single bird was shot near Yarmouth, 

 on the 28th of April, which there is little doubt had 

 remained to breed in that neighbourhood, and in the 

 latter end of June of the same year, Mr. King, bailiff to 

 Lord Wodehouse, at Kimberley, observed an old bird 

 and three young ones on a greengage tree in his garden, 

 which adjoins the park. On fetching his gun, he suc- 

 ceeded in shooting one of the young birds, and the 

 others never returned again. This was the first time he 

 had observed them in summer, but in sharp weather he 

 had frequently seen them on some whitethorn trees in 

 the park, a not unusual resort of the hawfinch. These 

 particulars were very kindly sent me at the time by Mr. 

 King, and the young bird, the first Norfolk bred haw- 

 finch I had ever seen, is now in my possession. In this 

 specimen the head, neck, and upper parts are yellowish 

 oHve brown, and the throat yellow, but with no apparent 

 indication of the black patch common to both sexes in an 

 adult state. From that time till the summer of 1860, I 

 could learn nothing further as to their nesting in Norfolk, 

 but on the 2nd and 8th of May in that year two birds 

 were shot having the dark blue beak of the breeding 

 season, and one of them, a female, had evidently been 



