London Birds. 3 



branches of the family, night fliers and day fliers, are 

 occasionally to be seen. 



There was a report in the summer of 1891 that an 

 Eagle had been seen circling over the East-end of 

 London. The rumour was unconfirmed, but was the 

 more likely to have been true, as about the same time 

 a big bird of the kind, which, from the description 

 given, was probably a young white-tailed Eagle, was 

 seen, heading northwards, by two gentlemen fishing 

 in the Stour, at Chartham, a few miles above Canter- 

 bury. 



Dr. Edward Hamilton, who published in the 

 Zoologist in 1879 a carefully compiled paper on 

 " The Birds of London, Past and Present, Resident 

 and Casual,"* numbering in all nearly a hundred, 

 says that "in 1859 a Kite was observed flying over 

 Piccadilly not above one hundred yards high," and 

 mentions as " casual visitors " the Peregrine Falcon, 

 Kestrel, and Sparrow Hawk. 



A large Owl a grave and reverend representative 

 of the night fliers was apprehended by the police- 

 constable on duty a year or two ago in the 

 Repository of the Public Record Office, and after 

 inquiry discharged with a caution unfortunately 

 before the species had been determined. 



Another, of a species also undetermined, has since 

 been recorded in the newspapers as having taken up 

 its quarters for some days in a tree in the grounds of 

 Guy's Hospital. 



We hear in these days much of the struggle for 

 existence which is going on everywhere in Nature, 

 and of adaptations in the forms of animals to the 

 conditions under which they have to carry on the 



* A list of the birds noticed in London, based on Dr. 

 Hamilton's paper is printed as an appendix. 



