368 BIRDS OP NORFOLK. 



week of its being stuffed, and its resemblance to the 

 figure of the dusky petrel in the third edition of YarrelPs 

 e British Birds,' and in the supplement to the second 

 edition (1856), struck me forcibly at first sight; con- 

 firmed, to a great extent, by the comparison of its 

 measurements (though a mounted specimen) with the 

 description given of the species by that author. 



" It proved, on dissection, to be a male in very poor 

 condition, and probably had been driven so far inland by 

 a gale, and met its death through coming in contact, at 

 night, with a tree or some other object, having a wound 

 on one side of the head, as if from a violent blow. It 

 showed no appearance of having been shot at ; and the 

 feathers, except on the spot mentioned, were clean and 

 unruffled; but the inner web of one foot was par- 

 tially nibbled away, as though a mouse or some other 

 vermin had been at it.* Fortunately I noted these 

 injuries at the time, which have enabled me to identify 

 the specimen again, beyond any doubt, though lost sight 

 of for the last thirteen years. Having been brought to 

 the birdstuffer by Captain Meade, and returned to him 

 when mounted and cased, I naturally inferred that the 

 petrel belonged to him ; and hearing some time after 

 that he had left England, and all his effects at Earsham 

 had been sold off, I presumed that this rarity was lost 

 to us altogether. In the absence of the bird itself, I was 

 unable to support my previous conviction as to the 

 species ; whilst subsequent accounts of extremely small 

 Manx shearwaters being occasionally met with, made me 

 question my own judgment in the first instance ; more 

 especially as my acquaintance with that class of marine 

 birds was somewhat limited at that time. I specially 

 mention this, because it will explain why I did not bring 

 the fact of the dusky petrel having occurred in Norfolk 

 under the notice of either the late Mr. Gould, when pub- 

 lishing his ' Birds of Great Britain/ or of Mr. Dresser 

 for his ' Birds of Europe/ neither of which authors has 



* This was my impression at the time ; but the examination of 

 a large number of pomatorhine and other skuas, killed on our 

 coast in 1877, showed that the webs of the feet, in this class of 

 birds, are frequently mutilated. 



