346 BIRDS OF SOMERSETSHIRE. 



COMMON CRANE, Grus cinerea. The present spe- 

 cies, the Common Crane, although it appears to be 

 now nearly extinct in England, does occasionally 

 appear, and an instance of its occurrence was noted 

 by me in the ' Zoologist' for 1865, nearly as fol- 

 lows: A Crane was shot on Tuesday, the 17th of 

 October, by Mr. Haddoii, of Taunton, at Stolford, 

 on the Bristol Channel, between Burnham and 

 Quantock's Head: it measured four feet eleven 

 inches in length from the toes to the tip of the bill, 

 and six feet ten inches from tip to tip of the ex- 

 tended wing: the weight was seven pounds and 

 three-quarters. These particulars were given me by 

 Mr. Haddon, as I had not an opportunity of ex- 

 amining the bird in the flesh, though I have often 

 seen it since in that gentleman's collection, and have 

 taken the following description from it. 



It is rather odd that in the very same year the 

 occurrence of three other Cranes in Great Britain 

 was recorded in the ' Zoologist ' one near Man- 

 chester, in May, and two in the Shetland Islands, in 

 July : before these the most recent occurrence which 

 I can find noticed was in 1854, in which year Yarrell 

 mentions one having been killed in Sussex, and he 

 mentions several instances from time to time before 

 then. In olden times it seems to have been more 

 numerous, and is often mentioned as a favourite dish 

 at great feasts. Mr. Newman, in his edition of 

 Montagu's Dictionary, quotes from the ' Ibis ' a very 



