378 Charadriadce. 



Grant, Rector of Manningford, from whose letter, dated Sept. 2nd, 

 1864, 1 quote the following particulars : ' I think you will be glad 

 to hear that the Norfolk Plovers I mentioned are alive and doing 

 well : my son picked them up on our downs between Manningford 

 and Everleigh. F. O. Morris says that " the young when fledged 

 will squat, and allow themselves to be picked up. If disturbed 

 from the nest, the parent runs oft' very swiftly, with the head 

 stooped.' This, my son states, is exactly what occurred when he 

 found the birds. About ten days after he had taken them, a 

 person called at my house with another young Norfolk Plover, 

 picked up on the Rushall or Charlton downs : and about the 

 same time I saw at least two pairs flying and hovering about the 

 downs near Sidbury Hill, not far from the old track from Marl- 

 borough to Salisbury. 



The Marlborough College Natural History Reports also state 

 that the egg was taken in June, 1866, in that neighbourhood, and 

 again on Overton Down in 1868, and again in May, 1874. Mr. 

 George Butler says that it still breeds on the downs near 

 Kennett ; Mr. G. Watson Taylor that it sometimes nests on the 

 downs above Erlestoke, where the keepers have caught the 

 young birds ; and Lord Heytesbury, on his keepers' authority, 

 that they come annually early in March to breed on the downs 

 above Heytesbury. 



The Rev. A. P. Morres has also had the young birds as well 

 as the eggs brought to him from the immediate neighbourhood 

 of Salisbury, and used to consider it by no means uncommon on 

 the downs near him ; but he laments, what I fear is also the case 

 in North Wilts, that it is rapidly decreasing in numbers. I 

 have, however, many notices of its recent appearance in Wilts. 

 In letters sent me this year (1887), Mr. F. Stratton says that 

 whereas it was getting scarce at Gore Cross Farm on the 

 Lavington downs some ten years since, it is now somewhat 

 more numerous there. The Right Hon. E. P. Bouverie informs 

 me that his son shot one last autumn on the downs above 

 Cheverell. Mr. W. Stancomb, jun., writes that they are often 

 seen on the downs above Colston, and Lord Arundel that he has 



