184 Notes on Natural History. 



I rode steadily, trying to make out what it could be ; when it disappeared as 

 suddenly as it came. The horse was taken from the stable, and had only travelled 

 half a mile ; it did not perspire in the least." 



T. H. Bakee, 



Mere Down. 



OCCURBENCE OF WhITE MiCE. 



With reference to this, the Vicar of Broad Town writes : — " Several years ago 

 my son brought from school a pair of white mice which he kept in his bedroom. 

 To my joy they escaped. Some two or three years afterwards Mr. William Price 

 was threshing a rick in his yard, at no great distance from the vicarage, and 

 destroyed a large number of mice, amongst others a quantity of white ones. We 

 always thought these were the descendants of my son's pair." 



Occurrence of the Gadwall at Stockton. 



With reference to the gadwall (Anas strepera), which many Members of the 

 Society saw at Stockton House, Mr. Ashley Dodd writes : — " I shot the gadwall 

 which you saw in the Justice Room at Stockton House, on the 7th January, 1893, 

 within a quarter of a mile of the house. The bird was one of three, and one of 

 the others was certainly an ordinary mallard, for I got him with the second 

 barrel. The man who picked up the birds said I had got a duck and a drake, 

 and it was not until I returned home that I knew that I had got a prize. 

 Having shot several in Egypt of course I recognised it at once." 



G. Ashley Dodd. 



[Mr. Smith, in his Birds of Wilts, only mentions one specimen of this duck 

 as having occurred in Wilts. This was shot at Amesbury in 1871.— Ed.] 



Stormy Petrel at Rcshall. 



In the Devizes Gazette for November 30th Mr. J. M. Harris reports that a 

 specimen of the Stormy Petrel (Thalassidroma pelagica) was shot on Rushall 

 Down on November 27th. 



Mr. Smith records four previous occurrences of this bird in Wilts— generally 

 after stormy weather. 



