4690 Tue ZooLocist—NovEeMBER, 1875. 
off at the wrong end, and leaving the other fellow dead. Strange indeed is 
the sight of the arrival of so many rare European birds in such quantities. 
You can stand on the sea-shore, or sit on your balcony in the town of Port 
Said, and see a string of birds on their way into the interior, looking for 
some place to settle. A quail will come into the baleony and “flop” down 
there, turtle doves and hoopoes settle on the house tops, whilst wayworn 
cuckoos and nightjars go cruising about the harbour, wandering in and out 
amongst the shipping. Nightingales and small fry settle on the heaps of 
coal which give the “colour local” to Port Said. Various are the traps 
and tricks devised by the Arabs to take small birds and quail. Bird-lime 
for the former, put on artificial and well-placed bushes, does great execution. 
For the latter a more complicated system is adopted. On a piece of open 
ground, near the sea-shore, long lines of rushes are stuck into the sand; the 
quail fly blindly against them and fall to the ground. At the base of the 
rushes tufts of long grass are put archwise, into the centre of which the 
quail crawls, and, never thinking of returning the way he entered, he runs 
his head into the net which is stretched over a corresponding hole at the 
back of the tuft. A simpler method is also used; a mere net, like a rabbit- 
net, but of smaller mesh, is stretched on any high land on the sea-shore ; 
the tired birds blunder into it, and are collected alive by the watchmen.— 
‘ Field.’ 
Whitetailed Eagle in Suffolkiw—An immature whitetailed eagle paid us 
a visit here a fortnight ago, and during its stay was fortunate enough to 
escape the keepers, who were on the look-out for it—Arthur J. Clark- 
Kennedy ; Little Glemham, Suffolk, October 13, 1875. 
Osprey in Suffolk.—Yesterday (October 12th), while canoeing, I was 
much pleased in watching the graceful evolutions of an osprey, hovering 
over the River Alde, about five or six miles from the sea-coast.—Td. 
Osprey in Hampshire—On the 27th of September a man came and 
asked me if I had seen the “salmon hawk”; I told him I had not, but on 
the following day I took a stroll by the river in the hope of seeing what 
I supposed was an osprey, and was not disappointed, having seen it swoop 
down from a considerable height and take a fish from the water. Several 
gunners and gamekeepers were on the alert for it, but I have not heard that 
it was killed, and as I have not seen it again for several days I hope it has 
got safely away. It is not the first osprey which has been seen in this 
neighbourhood, but the species ‘is of rare occurrence here, and it always 
appears in the autumn—possibly a bird of the year, whose plumage and 
experience are both immature. I saw one four or five seasons ago.—G. B. 
Corbin; Ringwood, Hants. 
Merlin killed against Telegraph Wires.—I had a splendid full-plumaged 
merlin, a male bird, brought me on Friday, the 1st instant: it had 
killed itself by flying against the telegraph wires. The bird was quite 
