8492 The Zoologist — April, 1873. 



Spotted Redshank. —A beautiful specimen of this bird was shot on the side 

 of a small poud in Beetwood Park, last August. There was another with it, 

 but the man only having a single-barrelled gun it escaped. — J.WhitakerJim. 



Gray Phalarope and Pike. — The gray phalarope seems to be com- 

 paratively rare along the Hampshire coast during the winter. One has 

 been taken, I believe, near Poole, but it is the only record I have seen. In 

 1870 this handsome little bird was taken in some numbers in this neigh- 

 bourhood, and I saw a small flock of six or seven on several occasions in 

 different parts of the Piiver Avon. I also saw one which was shot on the 

 river some twenty miles from the sea. During the same winter a fisherman 

 brought me a specimen which he obtained under the following circum- 

 stances : — He had shot the bird, which had fallen upon a pile of weeds in 

 the bed of the river, and as he was rowing towards it he distinctly saw a 

 large pike rise and take the bird the instant it fell. The fish, however, was 

 either mistaken in his victim or such a feathery mouthful did not exactly 

 suit him, for he immediately threw the interesting little bird up again, 

 when it was secured by the fisherman. — G. B. Corbiii. 



Black Swans. — On Sunday, the 9th inst., about 7.30 in the evening, 

 two black swans (rara aves in terra of the poet, Cygni atrati of the learned) 

 were seen wending their way along the coast at Walton-on-the-Naze from 

 the direction of Felixstow and Harwich harbour. They flew about ten 

 yards above the sea and fifty from the shore, passed the old jetty and took 

 a peep at the new, and then onwards towards Clacton. An enthusiastic 

 sportsman — spite of the Sabbath and gun-tax — set off from the hotel in a 

 boat, on murderous thoughts intent, and at Frinton he came up with his 

 quarrv, and fired his shot, which missed the swans, but, report saith, hit a 

 girl standing on the shore. Disgusted with their inhospitable reception, 

 the swans wended onwards, and were next heard of on the main at Brad- 

 well, opposite Mcrsea Island, where A. Mussett found, shot, and killed one. 

 He positively says that the bird wliich escaped had no white on the wings, 

 and was more black than the one captured, which was a male, with an 

 entirely empty stomach. Will any swan-keepers on the eastern coast inform 

 me if they have lost two black swans from their lakes or ponds ? And will 

 Z. account for the entirely blaqk bird? Most of your readers are aware that 

 Australia is the peculiar home of the black swan, and that it has never 

 appeared in Europe in a wild state. Still, extraordinary things do happen, 

 as for instance when the spine-tailed swift was shot near Colchester, and 

 the Egyptian vulture was killed at Peldon — to say nothing of the sand 

 grouse which a year or two ago paid a visit in force to our shores. — C. R. 

 Bree; July 'io.—From the ' Field: 



Ferruginous Ducks and Gadnalls in Leadenhall Market. — My brother 

 procured two ferruginous ducks {Anas Xyroca) on the 29th of January, in 

 the plumage of the first year, sex unascertained ; and two gad walls [Ana^ 



