9670 Birds. 



and out with food to their nests : they were scarcely ever away for 

 more than four minutes at a time, and occasionally passed so close to 

 us that we could see their throats quite distended with food. L. shot 

 one of them, a fine old bird with gray head, and on picking him up 

 we were astonished at the quantily of insects which immediately 

 issued from his bill, the majority of them still alive ; the greater por- 

 tion were beetles of four or five species ; the remainder were cater- 

 pillars, grubs and a large moth : altogether, I should think there was 

 enough to fill an ordinary-sized tible-spoon. I have little doubt but 

 that this habit of carrying in the bill a quantity of food, which neces- 

 sarily distends the throat, has given rise to the idea that the rook 

 (which has also this habit) possesses a pouch at the base of the under 

 mandible. 



Swift. — Swifts, as well as swallows, we saw flying about over the 

 cliffs, and from the buoyancy witli which we observed the former birds 

 pass under, and remain upon, the arched rock at Dm-dle Door, we 

 concluded that they breed there. The martins were numerous in the 

 village. No sand martins. 



Rock Dove. — Although I was assured that the rock dove breeds on 

 this coast, and that I should have little difficulty in obtaining both 

 birds and eggs, the only pigeons which I saw were certainly not 

 Columbia livia; they were either C. aenas or a cross between this 

 species and the wild dovecot pigeon. Tliey were all similar in colour, 

 and very dark, but in every case I looked in vain for the white tail- 

 coverts — a characteristic and distinguishing mark of C. livia. These 

 dark-coloured pigeons breed in the cliff's, and are known among the 

 fishermen as rock doves, although they are not the true rock dove, 

 C. livia. I will not say that the true rock dove does not occur here, 

 but only that we did not see it between Weymouth and St. Aldham's 

 Head, although out every day from morning till night. 



Ringed Plover. — This species breeds on the shingle between Wey- 

 mouth and Abbolsbury. We saw several of the eggs. 



Peewit. — Of the few waders which we observed along this coast in 

 May, the peewit is decidedly the commonest, an'd at Weymouth we 

 saw several dozen of their eggs, which had been taken within a few 

 miles of that town. 



Turnstone. — We saw a pair of these birds, which had been killed 

 near Weymouth during the first week in May, but they had not then 

 acquired their full summer plumage. 



Heron. — Occasionally seen along the River Frome, but more 

 common in winter, when they come down to the shore to feed. 



