50 THE SCOTTISH NATURALIST 



them of the second bird was neglected by an oversight, and details 

 are awanting ; but it is supposed to have been a young bird, m 

 which case nesting had probably taken place in the district. — 

 Douglas G. Hunter, Arbroath. 



Osprey in Forfarshire. — On or about the 27th of August last 

 Mr John Turnbull, gamekeeper, Kelly Castle, observed an Osprey 

 perched on a boulder in the Elliot Water. He had an excellent 

 view of the bird, having been screened from its sight by some shrubs. 

 Previous experience of the species in Aberdeenshire, where on one 

 occasion he shot a specimen, enabled him at once to identify the 

 bird. — Douglas G. Hunter, Arbroath. 



The Bittern — A Coincidence. — On ist March last I happened 

 to meet in London my friend Mr Abel Smith of Woodhall Park, 

 Herts, who told me that a few days before, on 14th February, two 

 persons, walking beside the Bean as it flows through his park, 

 noticed a large bird flapping on the river bank. They went to 

 the spot and found that it was a Bittern in distress from having 

 attempted to swallow a jack 6 inches long, which had stuck in its 

 gullet. They pulled out the fish, but it was too late to save the 

 bird, which expired at their feet. 



That, in itself, was an incident worthy of note, the Bittern being 



seldom met with in such a well-drained and populous shire as 



Herts ; but it was rendered still more noteworthy to me by the 



coincidence which followed. Leaving London on the evening of 



the day when I met Mr Abel Smith, I arrived home at 6 a.m. the 



following morning. While awaiting breakfast, I took up the fresh 



number of the Scottish Naturalist, and found on page 22 my Herts 



story capped by that of Mr M'Naughton's capture of a Bittern 



in Perthshire in circumstances singularly similar to those narrated 



above. The misadventure of these two birds in the same winter 



suggests speculation about the percentage of the Bittern population 



which perish through miscalculating their power of deglutition. It 



brings to mind the quaint aphorism which Sir James Turner placed 



on the title page of his Pallas Ar>?mta, a treatise on military tactics 



published in 1689 — Pho'es necat gula quam gladius ("Gluttony 



slays more people than the sword"). — Herbert Maxwell, 



Monreith. 



