BLACK-TAILED GODWIT. 249 



Horsey, and one or two other places." Mr. Lnbbock 

 evidently wrote guardedly as to their extinction, prob- 

 ably not having the opportunity at that time to ascertain 

 the fact conclusively, but there is no question that 

 prior to the date of his "Fauna" this species had 

 become, what it is now in this county, an irregular 

 migrant only. As far back as 1825,* we have the 

 following statement of Messrs. Sheppard and Whitear : 

 " Some of these birds used to breed in the marshes of 

 Norfolk, and three years since we received the egg of 

 this species from Yarmouth. But it is doubtful whether 

 they are to be found at present in their former haunts." 

 This doubt I can now satisfactorily clear up, on the 

 authority of Mr. Eising, of Horsey, who remembers a 

 godwit's nest in that neighbourhood in the summer 

 of 1829, and thinks it quite possible that these birds 

 may have bred there some few years later, but for 

 the next ten years, being invariably engaged in London 

 during the spring months, he had no means of satis- 

 fying himself on this point, although greatly interested 

 in the subject. If we assume, then, that in yearly 

 decreasing numbers they still frequented certain 

 favourite localities for a few seasons longer, their 

 extinction may, I think, be said to have occurred some- 

 where between the years 1829 and 1835. It seems 

 probable, however, that during the next twenty years 

 a pair or two occasionally returned to their old hauntsf 



* In 1824 the late Mr. C. S. Girdlestone wrote to Mr. Selby, 

 " I am informed the red godwits breed in some marshes ten miles 

 from hence [Yarmouth], but I cannot speak to the fact ; but this I 

 know, we had some here about the 20th of June last season, and 

 my bird-stuffer says he has had them in all the summer months, 

 and he is a man of veracity." 



t As the hen harrier and Montagu's harrier, now no longer 

 resident, are known to do from time to time. 



2K 



