1 68 APPENDIX. 



Bewick ov Mr. Daniel, but because it was related to me by the 

 late Mr. Pleydell himself when I was at Whatcombe House, where 

 the bird is now preserved. In Clenston Wood (a covert belonging 

 to the above place in Dorsetshire) a "Woodcock was taken alive in 

 one of the rabbit nets, in the month of February 1798. Mr. 

 Pleydell, after having a piece of brass marked, and passed round its 

 left leg, allowed the bird to be set at liberty ; and in the month of 

 December following, he shot this "Woodcock in the very same 

 coppice where it had been first caught by his gamekeeper." 



The same story is given somewhat differently in Bewick's 

 "British Birds" (vol. ii. ed. 1805, p. 6;^, note), to which work it 

 was communicated by Sir John Trevelyan. Thus : — 



"In the winter of 1797 {i.e. 1797-98), the gamekeeper of 

 E. M. Pleydell, Esq., of Whatcombe in Dorsetshire, brought him a 

 Woodcock which he had caught in a net set for rabbits, alive and 

 unhurt. Mr. Pleydell scratched the date upon a bit of thin brass, 

 and bent it round the Woodcock's leg, and let it fly. In Decem- 

 ber the next year [i.e., December 1798], Mr. Pleydell shot this 

 bird with the brass about its leg in the very same wood where it 

 had been first caught by the gamekeeper." 



Neither version is quite correct. The facts are these:— Three 

 Woodcocks were caught in the Whatcombe coverts the same year 

 in the month of February. My grandfather, after placing a brass 

 ring on a leg of each, let them go, and all three were killed the 

 following winter. Two were preserved, and are still here at 

 Whatcombe; the other escaped notice until after it had been 

 cooked and sent to table, when the discoloured ring attracted 

 attention. I think it may be inferred that the three birds had 

 remained here the whole year. — J. C. M. P. 



