616 The Zoologist— March, 1867. 



in Cambridgeshire some years ago, when our bag on one occasion 

 amounted to forty-five to four guns, and " all hands to skin" was the 

 order of the day. This was "positively the last" charge, and 

 accordingly all the way home herons and curlew allowed us to come 

 most provokingly near, encouraging desperate thoughts of firing away 

 my waistcoat-buttons at them ; a thing I have done at seal, but a 

 sacrifice which a curlew would hardly recompense. And, apropos 

 of seal, a large one came quite close to our coragh, and I was in- 

 formed that a good many are annually shot in the winter months 

 around this coast. 



It was now time to be leaving Dunfanaghy, so next morning 

 we took car to Crossroads, whence another took us to Gweedore, 

 where there is a capital hotel, maintained by Lord George Hill, 

 in order to attract tourists, and thus to better the condition of his 

 tenantry; this being but one of his many schemes for ameliorating 

 their condition. Would that there were more landlords like him. 

 He took much interest in our pursuits, and expressed his desire to 

 preserve eagles as much as possible, but avowed himself utterly 

 powerless against the efforts of the keepers and shepherds for 

 their extermination. Despatching a hasty lunch, Dr. Brady, the 

 agent, drove us down to the port of Bunbeg, where we intended to 

 take boat for Innishatter to try for a peregrine's nest, of which we had 

 heard. On the way we saw a dipper in the burn, and a pair of sand- 

 pipers which evidently had a nest. The little port was quite alive 

 with boats bringing "yah" and taking off grain and meal to the 

 neighbouring islands; in fact, the inhabitants were so much engaged 

 in their own business that we found it quite impossible to get men for 

 a boat. So long as Dr. Brady was by, every one said, " I go," but 

 eventually went not; and on his going to administer justice at the 

 court-house, our intended expedition resulted in a long palaver with 

 sundry ancient mariners, who succeeded in convincing us that there 

 were no falcous at Innishatter, though there might be a nest in Goula, 

 or the Bloody Foreland. It was now too late to visit either of these 

 places, so wearied out by the good-natured but determined obstruc- 

 tiveness of these people, who simply did not mean to go anywhere, 

 and carried their point, as an Irishman always will, we started for home, 

 spending an hour in an unsuccessful search for the sandpipers' nest 

 along the burn. We could learn nothing from the keeper respecting 

 eagles, only that there were plenty of merlins on the bogs, and that he 

 often found their nests, some of which he promised to get. 



