BIRDS OP THE HUMBER DISTRICT. 159 



the Cotes marshes, and had no doubt at the time it 

 was an escaped bird; it rose and flew towards and 

 past me at short pistol range. I heard some time 

 afterwards that one or two were shot on the river, 

 and supposed to have been tame. 



The Australian Black Swan (Cygnus niger] has 

 been killed both in East Yorkshire and Lincolnshire 

 during the last ten years, in both cases doubtless 

 birds which had wandered from private grounds 

 (see 'Zoologist' for 1864, p. 9251; also s.s. 1870, 

 p. 2410). 



208. TADORNA VULPANSER, Fleming. Common 

 Sheldrake. 



Provincial. Shell-duck, Skel-duck. 



Still not uncommon, breeding with us, but is not 

 nearly so numerously distributed as was the case fif- 

 teen to twenty years since. At that period a pair or 

 two bred in our north marshes, where the last nest I 

 heard of was taken from the joint between two straw- 

 stacks. At that time a pair or two also annually 

 nested on the Lincolnshire coast near Summercotes. 

 In 186 a pair bred near Cleethorpes, in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Grimsby, but in private grounds, to 

 which cause doubtless they owed their safety. The 

 Sheldrake still nests annually, in limited numbers, in 

 the neighbourhood of Spurn. 



In the winter of 1869-70 these Ducks were more 



