30 BIRDS OF NORFOLK. 



autumn and througliont the winter ; but the specimens 

 obtained are nearly all in immature plumage. Indeed, 

 so rare is the occurrence of this bird in its mature dress, 

 that I know of but four specimens killed in this district 

 which can be properly called adult, and these have 

 occurred in each instance so immediately on the borders 

 of the two counties, that they may be claimed equally 

 for Norfolk or Suffolk. The first in the collection of Mr. 

 Newcome, of Feltwell, was trapped at Santon-l)own- 

 ham in July, 1848 (" Zoologist," p. 2382) ; the second 

 in the possession of Mr. Thomas Dix, of West HarHng, 

 was taken on Thetford warren in November, 1857 ; and 

 another from the same locality is in the hands of Mr. 

 Doubleday, of Epping, as I have lately ascertained 

 through my friend Mr. Dix ; whilst the fourth is in Mr. 

 Gurney's collection at Catton, together with a less 

 matured bird, obtained at the same time, some few years 

 back. In the cross-barred markings of the thighs and 

 flanks, the bars on the lower part of the tail and the 

 bluish tinge in the feathers of the back and wings (but 

 this more especially in the first and second), these birds 

 closely resemble the adult specimens from Lapland, in 

 the Norwich museum, collected by the late Mr. WoUey, 

 to whom British naturahsts are indebted for the means 

 of pointing out the true difference in plumage betwixt 

 the young and the old in this species. These buzzards 

 vary considerably in numbers in different seasons, being in 

 some years very scarce, and in others visiting us in great 

 quantities, as was particularly the case in the winter of 

 1839 and 1840, when, according to Messrs. Gurney and 

 Fisher, " During the three months of November, Decem- 

 ber, and January, no less than forty-seven specimens 

 were ascertained to have been taken within eight miles 

 of the town of Thetford, besides many others which 

 were procured elsewhere." Since that date but few had 

 been observed from year to year until the autumn of 



