108 BIRDS OF LANCASHIRE. 



SUBFAMILY lYNGlN^E — GENUS lYNX. 



WEYNECK. 



Iynx torquilla, Linnaeus. 



Once a common summer visitor, now almost extinct. 

 Blackwall gives its dates of arrival and departure near 

 Manchester between 1814 and 1828 as averaging re- 

 spectively April 11 and September 9 ; but Mr. W. Pear- 

 son, writing of the valley, between Underbarrow Scar 

 and Cartmel Fell, says {Papers, d-c, 1863) that in 1838 

 it appeared April 28th, and in 1839 on May 1st, and 

 these last are probably the more correct dates, especially 

 if any argument is to be derived from its sobriquet of 

 * Cuckoo's mate.' Even so far back as 1849 Mr. Pear- 

 son noticed it decreasing in his neighbourhood, for, 

 writing on October 6th of that year, he says {op. cit.) 

 that he has not heard its note for two or three seasons ; 

 remarking also on the shyness of its habits, and that 

 its local name is " lang-tongue." Mr. J. B. Hodgkinson, 

 too, speaks of its abundance formerly near Witherslack, 

 and says that when he was a boy it frequently bred at 

 Frenchwood, near Preston. Mr. C. S. Gregson informed 

 Mr. A. G. More {Ihis, 1865) that he had once found its 

 nest in Lancashire, and the Piev. J. D. Banister notes 

 its occurrence in Wyresdale and at Stalmine. In 

 Winmarleigh, in the second week of June, 1883, Mr. 

 Arthur Breakell found a nest with seven fresh eggs, and 

 watched the old bird for some time, as she kept flying 

 from tree to tree, turning her head almost round, and 

 all the time making a peculiar noise between croaking 

 and hissing. The nest, of decayed bark and wood, was 



