INTRODUCTION. XXXlll 



Parallel with the shore, and extending over a con- 

 siderable area, are the far-famed Salthouse marshes, 

 which, prior to their drainage and embankment, in 

 1851, were the resort of hundreds of wild fowl in 

 hard weather, and the breeding grounds of the Avocet 

 (Becurvirostra avocetta) within the last forty or fifty 

 years, when they became exterminated by the same 

 thoughtless persecution as is now fast depriving us of 

 both Terns and " Stone-runners." A shallow tidal lake, 

 known as Salthouse ^' Broad," three-quarters of a mile 

 wide, and situate between the high lands and the sea, 

 was also, prior to the general reclamation, a noted spot 

 for fowl and waders, and a favourite resort of the Stork 

 (Ciconia alba) and the Spoonbill (Platalea leucorodia), 

 amongst the rarer grallatorial migrants ; in fact, next 

 to Breydon, there is no point of the coast where 

 more rare birds have been procured than on Salthouse 

 beach and marshes. In the winter of 1862, owing to 

 extraordinary high tides, a large portion of the embank- 

 ments was swept away, and the waters once more 

 spreading over their old level, and even extending to 

 the wide basin of the " Broad," were soon covered with 

 immense flocks of Gulls and other sea-fowl; nor has 

 the damage then caused to the banks been altogether 

 repaired up to the present time. A very favourite 

 resort too, at this point, for Ducks and many other 

 aquatic species, is a long narrow back-water, running 

 parallel with the beach, between the raised banks on 

 one side and the shingle on the other. Here the local 

 gunners shoot most of the fowl they obtain in winter, 

 by lying up for them behind the banks ; and Grey 

 Phalaropes (Phalaropus lohatus), Little Auks (Mergulus 

 alle), and other rarities, are procured in like manner. 

 In sharp weather, also, it is by no means uncommon 

 to find the Lesser Grebe (Podiceps minor), when frozen 



