294 BIRDS OF NORFOLK. 



her journal that, on the 25th May, 1834, "during a 

 heavy gale a gannet was taken at Trimingham asleep 

 under a bank near the cliif — it died a few days after it 

 was caught." Mr. Dowell mentions one picked up dead 

 on the Blakeney " wash," in October, 1846 ; on the 2nd 

 June, 1853, the year after the flood in the fens, the late 

 Mr, Newcome saw a gannet flying over Hockwold fen; 

 on the 27th June, 1863, Mr. F. Norgate found an adalt 

 gannet dead at Blakeney; in October, 1865, an adult 

 was killed near Holt; Mr. Stevenson records in the 

 '* Zoologist" for 1868, p. 1126, the capture alive of a 

 fine adult bird, on the 7th December, 1867, at Harford 

 Bridge, near Norwich ; it was driven inland by a gale, 

 and after its capture exhibited in a fishmonger's shop as 

 a "wandering albatross." A young bird was caught 

 alive in a field at Dunton, near Fakenham, about the 

 10th October, 1870 ; in this instance there had been no 

 stormy weather to account for its appearance so far in- 

 land ; about 16th January, 1877, an adult, storm driven, 

 was taken at East Ruston ; a male bird, also adult, was 

 caught at sea off Blakeney, resting on the water, appa- 

 rently asleep or exhausted, on 2nd September, 1880; 

 Mr. J. H. Gurney has another which was taken under 

 similar circumstances off Runton, on 15th October, 

 1887. An unusual number of these birds were brought 

 into Yarmouth by the smacksmen in the following 

 winter, many of them fine adults. An adult gannet 

 was found dead on the beach, at Wells, by Mr. F. B. 

 Middleton, in the middle of September, 1887. 



Mr. J. H. Gurney, jun., also, says that after pro- 

 tracted storms he has found birds of this species 

 washed ashore at Cromer, which he presumed had 

 perished for want of food. One of these, a male, 

 found on the 14th October, 1885, was in the piebald 

 stage of plumage, which is very uncommon here ; and, 

 on the 14th September, 1889, a gannet, in speckled 

 plumage, was taken alive in a turnip-field, near Cley- 

 next-the-Sea. 



The above are only some of what may be styled the 

 abnormal occurrences of this bird, the number of which, 

 on looking through my notes, I confess surprised me. 

 As a rule the gannet keeps far out at sea, following the 



