175 THE BIRDS OF BERKS AND BUCKS. 



CiRL BUNTING (Embcriza drlus}. In the year 

 1800, Colonel Montagu added the Cirl Bunting to 

 the British list, having discovered several in the 

 winter of that year near Kingsbridge, in Devonshire. 



The Rev. F. O. Morris states that in the summer 

 of 1826, or 1827, he procured one in the grounds of 

 East Garston Vicarage, near Lambourne, in Berk- 

 shire. He says that there were a pair, and that his 

 attention was first directed to them by the peculiarity 

 of their note, which was uttered from the top of an 

 elm tree, and which struck him as being different 

 from anything he had heard before, as there was a 

 peculiar sharpness in it. He adds that he had the 

 good fortune to obtain their nest and two eggs. 



Some unusually fine specimens of the Cirl Bunting, 

 in the collection of Mr. Gould, were procured in the 

 grounds of Formosa, near Cookham. The Rev. H. 

 Harpur Crewe has informed me of the occurrence of 

 this Bunting near Drayton Beauchamp. He states 

 upon the 4th of June, 1864, whilst walking on a rough 

 grassy down in the parish of Drayton Beauchamp, 

 he flushed a hen Cirl Bunting from her nest in a wild 

 juniper bush, which contained three eggs hard set, 

 and which I believe are now in his collection. In 

 the winter of 1862-3, a pair of these birds were 

 brought to him, which had just been caught alive in 

 a sieve-trap at Pitstone, in Bucks. Mr. Crewe further 

 assured me that he had observed the male bird on 

 two other occasions during walks about his parish. 



