Birds. . 9119 
Horsfall. The previously recorded instances of the occurrence of the little crake in 
Britain are as follows:—The first specimen occurred in Yorkshire, on the banks of 
the Yore, on the 6th of May, 1807; a second, in the same year, at Adwick, near Man- 
chester; the third, near Ashburton, Devon, in 1809; the fourth was killed in Norfolk 
in May, 1812; the fifth, near Chelsea, also in 1812; and in March, 1826, a female 
specimen was caught at Barnwell, near Cambridge. I cannot refrain from men- 
tioning the singularly interesting fact that the first example and the last in this county 
occurred in the same month and at near the same spot, the boundaries of Barnwell 
and Chesterton joining at the piece of fenny ground in which these captures occurred, 
and both specimens were caught, not shot. The nidification of this species commences 
at the end of May. Meyer says the little crake has a very great peculiarity that 
belongs solely to itself—that is, its curiosity. If a person carefully approaches the 
spot where a bird is known to be, it may be seen to come to the edge of the swamp 
and utter its piping call-note, as it were in astonishment at what it sees.—S. P. 
Saville; High Street, Kings Lynn, May 11, 1864. 
Early Breeding of the Wovdcock.—I send you a note of the early breeding of the 
woodcock, at least what I consider early, as in this part the weather has been very 
cold with frost. The nest was found on the 13th of April in Methven Wood, con- 
' taining four eggs, very much darker than any eggs I have seen of the woodcock, the 
larger end quite dark brown ; they were close upon hatching, and, as it requires seventeen 
days’ incubation, some of the eggs must have been laid at the latter end of March. Last 
year I saw a nest, containing four eggs, on the 6th of July.—TZ. Brunton; Methven 
Castle, Perth, April 18, 1864. 
Gray Lag Geese in Norfolk.—On the 5th of March I purchased in our fish- 
market a fine specimen of that now scarce bird, the true Anser ferus, or gray goose, 
and on the 12th of the same month another, both having been killed out of a small 
flock on Ludham Broad. On dissecting these birds I found them both males, and 
evidently adult, but in neither case was there any indication of the white front ob- 
servable in many birds of this species, and the under parts of the breast presented only 
the faintest indication of the cross bars, which in some specimens are almost as marked 
as in the laughing goose (Anser albifrons). The first bird, which weighed 73 Ibs., 
measured 55 inches from tip to tip of wings; length from tip of beak to end of tail 
33 inches; wing from carpal joint to end of second quill 18 inches; beak from 
base along the upper surface to the nail 3 inches; tarsus 3} inches; middle toe 
and claw 4 inches; inner toe 384 inches; outer toe 3% inches; hind toe and 
claw 13 inch. Feet livid-pink; claws slate-colour; beak pink flesh-colour, nearly 
purple (dead bird) round the edge of the mandibles; nail white; eyelids white all 
round; eyerials red-hazel, very dark. The second specimen differed only in being 
about one inch longer from beak to tail, and the same in extent of wings. In both 
cases the stomachs were filled with short wiry cuarse grass, having a brackish smell.— 
Hi. Stevenson; Norwich, April 27, 1864, 
The Flumingo.—Not far from this is a small salt lake, which I had visited for a 
few days during the previous spring, and which abounds in birds of every variety. 
Conspicuous among them is the flamingo. On approaching the lake, a long white line 
could be seen stretching right across it, looking somewhat, by its slightly undulatory 
motion, like the foam of a line of breakers on a reef. But the alarm is given, the 
white line becomes animated, rises and expands,—first of a snowy white, then, as the 
birds simultaneously turn, unfolding thousands of black wings, it appears a dark, 
