ACCIDENTAL VISITORS. 



2S7 



appeared at Thorpe May 28, 1863; a female was shot and brought to 

 Mr. Hele; many small dark seeds were found in the crop, some were 

 planted and proved to be the Trifolium minus (Smith) or Lesser Trefoil; 

 many more coveys visited the neighbourhood. On June 11, fifteen birds 

 passed alongshore towards the south, and on the 19th more than twenty 

 were seen at Thorpe ; some remained through July, keeping mostly to 

 the shingly beach; they were very wild and flew rapidly; one was killed 

 on the 25th. Mr. Hele says that altogether ten birds were procured in 

 the neighbourhood; two were seen at Thorpe Nov. 22 (Hele, Aid., 102, 

 103). Mr. Dix received five at least of these birds at the time of their 

 remarkable appearance, but retained only one pair, a male and a female, 

 from Aldborough, killed June 18G3 (Miss Dix in liti). 



3. More than twenty seen at Tangham near Butley in 1863, they 

 remained there for six weeks or more ; a pair in Lord Rendlesham's 

 Collection (Lord Rendlesham v.v. ; C. B. !); a flock of about eight or ten 

 seen about the end of Aug. or beginning of Sept. near Woodbridge on 

 some open heath land near the river towards Orford, they were said to 

 have been seen there all the summer ; these birds it was believed, were 

 on Lord Rendlesham's property (Dix in Stev. B. of N. i., 390); this 

 flock was probably part of the flock mentioned by Lord Rendlesham as 

 seen at Tangham (C. B.); a single bird was seen at Alderton Sept. 18, 

 1863 (H. Stevenson in Z. 8850). 



West Suffolk. 

 7. Three birds killed at Santon-Downham in June or July 1863, 

 they were thrown away, but from the description given by the keeper, 

 there is no doubt that they were of this species (Dix in Stev. B. of N. 

 u. s.). Several were said to be killed on Wangford warren about June 6, 

 1863, and sent to London, where they probably found their way to the 

 poulterers. A male taken alive at Elveden June 6, 1863 ; it was caught 

 by a boy among long grass and brought to Prof. Newton ; he found 

 that it had been slightly wounded ; the man who had shot it told him 

 that it " shruck " like' a Golden Plover ; Prof. Newton kept it alive 

 feeding it on canary-seed, and subsequently sent it to the Zoological 

 Gardens, where, in company with several others from China, it lived 

 for nearly a year (Newton u. s., 203, 204 and MS.). 



Districts. — 1, 2, 3, 7. 



Months. — May, June, July, September, November. 



The irruption of this bird into Europe is the most 

 remarkable fact that has ever occurred in the history of 

 ornithology. Mr. Stevenson (B. of N. L, 376—404) gives a 

 very ample and most interesting account of the occurrences 

 of this bird, in Norfolk in 1 863, written a little later ( 1 866), 

 than his papers in the Zoologist 1863-4. He estimates the 

 number actually obtained in Norfolk and Suffolk in May 



