OTIDID.E. 



509 







fly' 'V 



THE GREAT BUSTARD. 



Otis tarda, Linnaeus. 



Until the year 1526 the Cireat Bustard used to breed, sparingly, 

 as far north as tlie flat portion of the Lothians, on the Scottish 

 side of the Border ; and southward it was common on the moors, 

 extensive downs and plains of England, to the Channel. Enclo- 

 sure, the planting of trees, and the increase of population con- 

 tributed to the gradual diminution of its numbers, and it passed 

 away, unrecorded, from Iserkshire, Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire, the 

 wolds of Lincolnshire and the downs of Sussex, while the first ten 

 years of this century saw the extinction of the birds indigenous to 

 Salisbury Plain. On the Eastern Wolds of Yorkshire the survivor 

 of former droves was trapped in 1832-33; and in Norfolk and 

 Suffolk the last fertile eggs were taken about 1838, though a few 

 birds lingered to a somewhat later date. The Bustard is now only an 



