220 BRITISH BIRDS. 



had been duly noticed in Willughby's Latin edition of the 

 " Ornithology " (pp. 19 and 95). 



Plot's other work, " The Natural History of Staffordshire," 

 was pubhshed in 1686, and is altogether a more important 

 and far rarer book than the one above mentioned. Its full 

 title is as follows : — 



The / Natural History / of Stafford- shire / by / Robert Plot, 

 LL.D. / Keeper of the / Ashmolean Museum / and / Professor 

 of Chymistry / in the / University / of / Oxford. / Ye shall 

 describe the Land, and bring the Description hither to me. 

 Joshua 8. V. 6. / [Engraving] Oxford / Printed at the 

 Theater, Anno M. DC. LXXXVI. 



1 Vol. foHo. 



Collation : pp. 16 un. ^ pp. 450 + pp. 14, Index, 

 " Proposalls of the Author," and list of Subscribers. Map, 

 XXXVII. Plates, and extra Plate of " Armes omitted." 

 (This last plate is very seldom found in the original state.) 



Birds are treated of in Chapter VII., pp. 228 — 236, and 

 though the observations are somewhat fuller than in the same 

 author's " Natural History of Oxfordshire," their principal 

 interest lies in the curious account of the nesting of the Pewit 

 {i.e., the Black-headed Gull, Larus ridihundus). A small 

 portion of this account is given in the fourth edition of 

 Yarrell's " British Birds " (Vol. III., p. 599).* But as it is 

 of considerable interest we here give it in full, together with a 

 facsimile of the original plate, showing the taking of the young 

 Pewits, t 



" But the strangest whole-footed water fowle that frequents 

 this county is the Larus Cinereus Ornithologi, the Larus 

 Cinerus tertius Aldrovandi, and the Cepphus of Gesner and 

 Turner ; in some Counties called the black-Cap, in others the 

 Sea or Mire-Crow, here the Pewit ; which being of the 

 migratory kind, come annually to certain pooles in the Estate 

 of the right WorshipfuU Sr. Charles Skrymsher Knight to 



* The quotation in " Yarrell " is by no means word perfect ; it did 

 not appear in the first three editions of that work. 



t Plot uses the speUing, Pewit or Pewet, indifferently. 



