182 THE BIRDS OF SHERWOOD FOREST. 



I have been favoured by the Rev. C. Thompson, rector 

 of Kirton near Ollerton, with some particulars of two 

 birds which he shot in Kirton Wood, in October, 1865. 

 From the description he has sent me, I think it most pro- 

 bable that they were hybrids between the blackcock and 

 the pheasant. The first was shot in an isolated part of 

 the wood, and proved to be a female. It was about the 

 size of a blackcock, with naked legs and feet. The 

 plumage on the back and neck was mottled brown and 

 black, very similar to the back of the common snipe ; 

 breast and belly, brownish-white, not unlike the breast 

 of a wild duck ; tail square, with the two centre feathers 

 rather longer than the rest, and the whole of them 

 slightly tipped with white. Mr. Thompson had seen 

 this bird in the same wood the previous winter, and she 

 had also been noticed in the summer with two nearly 

 full-grown young ones, in a cornfield near. She was killed 

 on the 3rd of October, and on the following day Mr. 

 Thompson shot in the same wood a male bird equally 

 remarkable in its peculiarities. Its size was about that 

 of a cock pheasant, but the whole of the plumage of 

 the body was mottled black and brown ; the head was 

 black ; neck, very dark glossy green ; a ring of bright 

 scarlet skin round the eye ; iris black ; tail similar in 

 stiape to that of a cock pheasant, but shorter, the colour 

 dark brown, having each feather tipped with black ; 

 legs and feet naked. 



Mr. Thompson thinks, and with great probability, that 

 this bird was the offspring of the hen he shot the day 

 before, one of the two young ones previously mentioned. 



I much regret that these two birds were not pre- 

 served ; but Mr. Thompson was not aware of their value 

 as instances of hybridism. 



