Manchester Memoirs, Vol. hi. (191 2), No. 8. 3 



time by men who kept the matter secret in order to give 

 the colonists a chance. In 1874 Mr. Meade-Waldo began 

 to establisii colonies in Kent, and several years later in 

 Hampshire, He naturally waited until the birds were 

 established before he gave the matter publicity, and it is 

 significant that though the later Hampshire experiments 

 are referred to by many writers, it is only recently that 

 the fact of the earlier Kentish colonisation has been made 

 known. Lord Kimberley and Mr. St. Ouintin followed 

 Waterton's example in Yorkshire. Lord Lilford turned 

 many birds loose in Northamptonshire, and the Hon. 

 Walter Rothschild released others in Hertfordshire. 



One or two of these experiments are said to have been 

 failures because no nests were immediately found in the 

 neighbourhood; but that does not prove anything, for the 

 owls may have nested elsewhere. 



An early reference to the bird as British is in 

 Montagu's "Ornithological Dictionary,"* under. " Owl- 

 Little, Sfrix passerinn" which is more correctly the name 

 of the Pygmy Owl. 



" We are assured by Mr. Comyns, that a neighbour 

 shot at one of this species in the north of Devon, in the 

 autumn of 180S." 



This lucid note is accepted as evidence that the bird 

 is an occasional visitor. Geo. Edwards ^ figures one which 

 was caught alive in a chimney near the Tower of London 

 in 1758, and refers to another in a similar situation in 

 Lambeth. The particulars given, even supposing that the 

 second bird was really a Little Owl, suggest escaped birds. 



Pennant, in his " British Zoology," 18 12,® as well as 



* Montagu, G., " Ornithological Dictionary," Exeter, 1813. Supple- 

 ment. 



^ Edwards, G., " Gleanings of Natural History," London, 175S-1764, 

 i., 228. 



' Pennant. T., ''British Zoology," London, 1812, i., 270. 



