266 BIRDS OF THE WEST OF SCOTLAND. 



Rev. James Headrick in his Agricultural View of Forfarshire, 

 published in 1813. Under the heading, " Winged Fauna," in 

 section xi. of this work, he says: "The green plover, or peeseweep, 

 appears early in spring and goes off in autumn. As they only 

 come north for the purpose of incubation, and are very lean, none 

 of them are liked for food. They return to the fenny districts 

 of England, where they get very fat, and are killed in great 

 numbers. In consequence of the inveteracy excited by the 

 ambitious pretensions of Edward I. to the Scottish crown, an old 

 Scottish Parliament passed an Act ordering all the peeseweeps' 

 nests to be demolished and their eggs to be broken; assigning as a 

 reason, that these birds might not go south and become a delicious repast 

 to our unnatural enemies the English." A similar law, but without 

 any fixed time of enactment, is alluded to in Burt's "Letters from 

 the North of Scotland," and has also been referred to by Bishop 

 Stanley in his " Familiar History of Birds," but I have altogether 

 failed in my endeavours to get any authenticated copy of it entire. 

 Dr Barclay, of Perth, has obligingly aided me in this search, and 

 Professor Cosmo Innes, of Edinburgh than whom there could, 

 perhaps, be no better authority has expressed to me his conviction 

 that no such law was ever passed. 



THE TURNSTONE. 



STREPSILAS INTERPRES. 



COMMONLY distributed over all the Scottish coasts, remaining in 

 some of the western counties until the second week of June, and 

 reappearing in the outer islands about the middle of August. 

 Mr Graham mentions that he has shot the Turnstone in its nuptial 

 dress in lona in early summer a few pairs being usually found 

 lingering on the shores of that island till the end of May and 

 that he also shot the species on the island of Staffa in the end of 

 June. The birds were going in pairs, and were in full summer 

 plumage, from which my correspondent inferred they might 

 have been breeding on the island. 



In August, 1867, when travelling in the Outer Hebrides, 

 I observed, for several days in succession, flocks of Turnstones, 

 all clad in their beautiful tortoise-shell dress, frequenting the 

 sound of Benbecula, where they had been seen late in June 



