380 BIRDS OP NORFOLK. [APPENDIX A.] 



rences Mr. H. A. Macpherson, in April, 1877, as lie 

 informed Mr. J. H. Gurney, jun., purchased a pair of 

 these birds of a London bird-catcher, which were said 

 to have been recently caught at Yarmouth. The male 

 died at once, and the female was so wild that after a 

 few weeks she was suffered to fly away. The repeated 

 observations of the occurrence of this species, and the 

 fact that its range on the continent of Europe is known 

 to have been of late years extending, appear to be 

 evidence in favour of the examples being genuine wild 

 birds ; and, although the month of February seems an 

 unlikely season for it to appear, this is not the only 

 example which has been met with in that month. See 

 Yarrell, ed. 4, ii., p. 112. 



TICHODROMA MURARIA (Linnaeus). 

 WALL-CREEPER. 



The record of the occurrence of this species in the 

 county of Norfolk is not a little singular. In the year 

 1875 Mr. H. P. Mar sham, of Rippon Hall, near Norwich, 

 was good enough to place in my hands, as secretary of 

 the Norfolk and Norwich Naturalists' Society, a series 

 of letters written to his great grandfather, Robert Mar- 

 sham, F.R.S., of Stratton, by Gilbert White, and to this 

 correspondence we owe the knowledge of the fact that 

 on the 30th October, 1792, a wall-creeper was shot at 

 Stratton Strawless, near Mr. Marsham's house. The 

 corresponding letters from Marsham to White were in 

 the possession of the late Professor Bell, and by a 

 mutual exchange the complete series was published both 

 in the " Trans, of the Norfolk and Norwich Nat. Soc." 

 (ii., pp. 133-195) and in Professor Bell's edition of the 

 "Natural History of Selborne." The first mention of 

 the bird occurs in a letter from Marsham to White, 

 dated Otober 30, 1792, in which he says, 



f< My man has just now shot me a bird, which was 

 flying about my house ; i am confident i have never seen 

 its likeness before. But on application to Mr. Willughby, 



