PIED, FLYCATCHEE — GOLDEN OEIOLE. 45 



spring, about the year 1860, Mr. W. Wyatt of Banbury and 

 a friend shot three Pied Flycatchers at Pinhill, between Ban- 

 bury and Han well, but he did not have another specimen 

 through his hands until 1888, when a remarkably fine adult 

 male (the skin of which is in my possession) was sent to him 

 on the 3rd May from the neighbourhood of Alkerton. Another 

 male had been shot over the Northamptonshire boundary the 

 day before. On the 29th April, 1888, Mr. Julius Sankey, of 

 Oxford, saw a single bird in a lane at the corner of Marston 

 Wood near the city. 



THE GOLDEN ORIOLE. 



Oriohis galhula. 

 The Golden Oriole is a rare summer visitor to England, 

 and has been procured in Oxfordshire on three occasions. 

 A specimen in the dress of the female, or immature male, was 

 shot near Chipping Norton Junction station in May, 1862 (R. 

 F. Tomes in lit.), and a fine adult male at Bloxham Grove, in 

 a field studded with hawthorn trees, in the spring of either 

 1869 or 1870, most likely the latter, as in that year a number 

 of these beautiful birds appeared in the south-west of England. 

 Early in May, 1880, two adult male Golden Orioles were shot 

 in a wood near Great Tew, and brought to Mr. Wyatt of 

 Banbury, from whom I purchased them a day or two after. 

 The man who shot them said they were carrying grasses up 

 into trees and hanging them over the branches, a circum- 

 stance which suggests the probability that they were engaged 

 in forming their curious nests, which are suspended under the 

 forked boughs of trees ; the hen birds were doubtless also 

 present, but escaped notice on account of their more sombre 

 plumage. One of these two males, which are now in my 

 brothers^ collections, is in peculiarly fine plumage, the golden 

 yellow colour being remarkably deep and rich. 



