60 THE BIRDS OF DEVONSHIRE. 



dilapidated condition, and presenting the appearance 

 of having been mounted from a freshly killed 

 specimen. Indeed, Mr. Newton's daughter informed 

 us (this was in the summer of 1876), that she well 

 remembers the day when her father received the 

 bird, and his excitement at adding such a rarity to 

 his collection. He was ill in bed at the time from 

 gout, and made her write off at once to his friend 

 Dr. Moore of Plymouth to acquaint him of this 

 most interesting acquisition" (Rev. M. A. Mathew, in 

 lit). Dr. Moore evidently believed the specimen to be 

 authentic, since he retained it as late as 1818, in the 

 account of the ornithology of Dartmoor which he 

 furnished to Rowe's Perambulation of Dartmoor. 

 The Rev. Clement Ley writes that he is well 

 acquainted with the note of the Great Black Wood- 

 pecker, and that the last occasion he heard it ' ' was 

 in 1876, at Mount Edgecombe in Devonshire," and 

 that " waiting for a few minutes, we got a fine view 

 of the bird," (B. of Herefordshire, p. 92). 



It may be interesting to add that Mr. Brooking 

 Rowe included the Great Black Woodpecker in his 

 list of 1863, but afterwards struck it out from the 

 revised copy which he sent to the British Museum 

 Library, as though he had changed his mind about 

 it.] 



GREEN WOODPECKER.— (9ecmws vkidis (Linn). 



A FAIRLY common resident, during the spring months, 

 its laughing cry may frequently be heard in our 



