Dr Smitlis Ornithological Notes. 115 



(4.) LaniiLS excuhitor, Great Grey Shrike. — A male specimen 

 of this occasional visitor. It was shot by one of the Duke 

 of Buccleuch's keepers, on the 9th of March, at Bowhill, 

 Selkirkshire. 



(5.) ITptcpa epops, Hoopoe. — A fine male bird, and rare 

 visitor, was killed at Burntisland, Fife, on the 25th April 

 of this year. The specimen exhibited, was purchased, on 

 the 6th October, by Mr Stavert, 18 Eoyal Terrace, from a 

 railway surface-man at the Inner wick station (Haddington- 

 shire) of the Xorth British Railway, who had recently caught 

 it there alive, and it was brought by Mr Stavert alive to Mr 

 William Hope, taxidermist, George Street. The bird was a 

 female. 



(6.) Charadrius morincllus, Dotterel. — Two young males 

 and two females, also youug birds. These birds were brought 

 to Mr William Hope, taxidermist; they had been shot at 

 Dalnaspidal, Perthshire, on the 17th August; also a female, 

 shot in the same neighbourhood, on the 8th September 1876. 

 Other birds of the same kind had been noticed on the tops 

 of the hills of this high district for several years past, about 

 the same time of the year, but the species had not before been 

 determined. The bird is one of our local summer visitors, 

 and its rare breeding-places occur only on the very tops of 

 high mountains. Mr T. C. Heysham first described their 

 breeding-places near Carlisle, in Cumberland, and Westmore- 

 land ; and Mr Ptobert Gray, in his valuable " Birds of the 

 West of Scotland," has gathered together for us, various 

 notices of its rare occurrence and suj)posed breeding-places ; 

 in Sutherlandshire, Inverness-shire, Aberdeenshire, and the 

 adjoining counties, and also in Dumfriesshire ; they appear, 

 however, to occur only in small flocks ; and some of these 

 localities may perhaps need further confirmation. This, then, 

 appears to be an addition to the localities where these birds 

 have been observed ; and from the time of the year when they 

 were killed, and the immature state of the plumage of some 

 of them, it may, probably, be considered an addition also to 

 the breeding-places of these very locally-distributed birds. 

 I may mention that two of these specimens were secured for 

 our " Museum of Science and Art ; " another pair by Mr 



