Birds. 9683 



n-ere wheeling and whistling high above the cliff, I noticed bats 

 hawking backward and forward at the foot close to the face ; it was 

 dusk. Swifts breed at Bolton Priory. 



Caprimalgidce. — The nightjar occurs, I believe, in some numbers, 

 about Bolton Bridge. 



Cohfmbidce. — I heard the cooing of the ring dove occasionally; its 

 moaning notes seemed to enhance the solitude of the glens. 



Chi ir ad r idee. — Nests of ihe golden plover are frequently found by 

 the keepers. The lapwing is one of the commonest moor-birds; some 

 of the egg-colleclors send between six and seven hundred eggs to 

 London annually. The lapwings, when very young, will skulk 

 when any one is in search of theiri. I was led by the cries of an old 

 one to search in a certain spot, and I perceived a young one huddling 

 close to the ground. 1 sat down about a yard from it, and it kept its 

 position among the stunted grass all the time I stayed, perhaps half 

 an hour. 



Scolopacida:. — Curlews breed here and are common ; they occa- 

 sionally wheel over the pedestrian's head, after the manner of the lap- 

 wings, uttering at the time their singular babbling note. The sand- 

 piper and snipe breed here. 



RallidcB. — I only heard the landrail once; it is found in the dales, 

 but I think it is not common. 



George Roberts. 



Loflhouse, near Wakefield. 



Ornithological Notes from Shropshire. By John Rocke, Esq. 



Few counties in England are better stocked at the present time 

 with our feathered tribes, and few have been more pi'oductive of the 

 rarer sorts, than Shropshire. This may be very easily accounted for 

 from the varied nature of its formation : it abounds in rugged hills, 

 fertile valleys and highly cultivated plains ; its rivers and brooks inter- 

 sect the county in every direction, and it can still boast of large wood- 

 lands and wild uncultivated moorlands, as the Longmynd and Clun 

 Forest. The Welsh coast is not more than sixty or seventy miles 

 distant, though, singularly enough, I do not consider the class of birds 

 which usually inhabit the shores of this country at all amongst its 

 richest productions. 



Some years ago Mr. Eyton published a short account of the 

 "Fauna of Shropshire and North Wales," in the 'Annals and 



