ALECTORIDES. ( 207 ) OTIDIDJE. 



THE GREAT BUSTARD. 

 Otis tarda. 



The big-boan'd Bustard then, whose body beares that size. 

 That he against the wind must runne, e'er he can rise. 



Drayton, Polyolbion. 



Although there is no record of the Great Bustard having 

 been found in Berwickshire since the early part of the 

 sixteenth century, it may not be out of place to refer to 

 it here, for the first British author who gave any account 

 of the bird wrote of it in 1526 as then inhabiting the 

 Merse. This was Hector Boece, who says : " Besides these, 

 we have, moreover, another foule in Mers more strange and 

 uncouth than all these aforementioned, called a Gustard, 

 fully so great as a Swanue, but in colour of feathers and 

 taste of flesh little differing from a Partriche ; howbeit these 

 byrdes are not verie common, nayther to be seen in all 

 places ; such also is their qualitie, that if they perceive 

 their egges to have bene touched in theyr absence by man's 

 hands (which lie commonly on the bare earth), they for- 

 sake those nestes and lay in other places."^ Mr. Hardy 

 gives the following Latin version of the above from the 

 original Scotorum Historia of Boece : — " Praeter haec aves in 

 Merchia nascuntur Gustardes vernaculo sermone dictae, 

 colore plumae ac carne perdicibus non dissimiles, sed quae 

 olores corporis mole exuperant. Eara est ea avis atque 



1 The Description of Scotlande, in Hollinshed's Chronicles, first edition, vol. i. 

 p. 10 (1577). 



