86 THE ZOOLUGIST. 
House—taught one to perform all sorts of tricks.* He fixes 
this at forty years since.” Sir D. Majoribanks also states that 
both Frazer and Rory MacDonald “say that the bird was 
common previously to 1851, but neither can fix the time of its 
disappearance, or when it began to grow of scarce occurrence.” 
He adds, “I have no manner of doubt about the Woodpecker 
being Picus major, and I can state most positively that the 
holes, pointed out to me as the work of the Woodpecker, were 
quite capable of admitting any British Squirrel (more especially 
ones of this district}, being the size of ordinary rat-holes.” 
Another reason assigned for the decrease and total disappearance 
of the species is, that, after smuggling came in, the smugglers 
made use of the decayed trees for firing, which the proprietors 
winked at so long as they did not touch the sound trees; but this 
cannot be held widely and generally applicable, or sufficient in 
itself to account for their present scarcity. In 1855 there were 
“hundreds and hundreds of white trunks of firs burnt and drying 
within a mile of this house.” 
The Rev. George Gordon, of Birnie, in his ‘ Fauna of Moray,'t 
states that—‘“'['wo specimens were procured in 1838, by Mr. 
Wink, from the woods of Castle Grant, which it has long been 
known to inhabit.” Mr. Gordon, writing to me later, adds, 
*T can well recollect that Mr. Wink, when I asked him, had no 
doubt of getting specimens from the gamekeepers, which he did.” 
During the breeding season of 1867-68, Mr. R. Gray? 
examined specimens shot in Banff-, Aberdeen-, and Inverness- 
shires. The last shot at Guisachan was got in the spring of 
1869, by one Henderson, as I am informed by Sir Dudley 
Majoribanks. 
All my own notes of its occurrence since that date refer to its 
appearance in winter. There are still numerous traces of its 
“boring” and “tapping” at Guisachan; and at Carr Bridge, 
and on Speyside generally. 
In no instance can any of my witnesses, now living, state 
precisely at what time the bird began to get scarce, nor can any 
* Stevenson, in his ‘ Birds of Norfolk,’ also makes mention of the fact that this 
species “thrives well in confinement,” and is “very active and mischievous” 
(op. cit. vol. i., p. 291), and I have other evidence of the fact that this bird was a 
favourite cage-bird in Scotland before it became scarce. 
+ *The Zoologist,’ 1844, p. 510. 
t ‘ Birds of the West of Scotland,’ p. 190. 
