386 THE BIRDS OF SUSSEX. 



which will be familiar to readers of Whitens ' Selborne/ 

 edited by Bennett)^ and dated 12th December^ 1835 : — " A 

 few months ago, that is to say, at the commencement of 

 August 1835, I observed, day after day, a Swan, which was 

 a male of the kind called Wild Swan, or Whooper, standing 

 on the upland turf, which, from long continuance of dry 

 Aveather, was as brown as a beaten road, by the side of a little 

 paled enclosure adjoining the entrance lodge in Petworth 

 Park. Having enquired from the man inhabiting the lodge, 

 who had the superintendence of the water-fowl on the large 

 piece of water in the park, why that Swan was to be seen 

 constantly in a situation so uncongenial to the habits of his 

 race, he informed me that in the spring of 1834 it had had a 

 mate, with a brood of young Swans, in a hovel within the 

 little paled enclosure, where she and the young ones had 

 died; and that ever since, the male Swan had persevered in 

 haunting the spot, and forcing his way there whenever he 

 could find an opportunity, as if in search of them ; but that 

 at night he retired to the water in the park. Such an 

 instance of conjugal constancy in a bird deserves to be 

 recorded/^ 



Mr. G. C. Atkinson, of Newcastle, met with a nest of this 

 species during his visit to Iceland. It was placed in the 

 centre of a small island, not more than fifteen or twenty 

 yards in diameter, and just rising above the freshwater lake 

 by which it was surrounded. The nest was made of water- 

 plants, and raised about six inches above the sward on which 

 it was placed ; it was about eighteen inches in diameter, 

 lined with materials similar to those used in its outward 

 structure, and contained three eggs in the last stage of 

 incubation. Mr. Proctor savs that this species lines its nest 

 with down, with which the eggs are also covered. Mr. WoUey 

 -met with the nest iu Lapland (see Hewitson, vol. ii. p. 393, 

 ed. 3). 



