494 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
from rock to rock by the side of the stream: they were in the 
nestling plumage, their white under parts showing a yellowish tint 
closely marked with faint semicircular lines. Young Green Wood- 
peckers were also numerous in the adjoining woods; and a beautiful 
young male, fully fledged, was caught by a friend of mine when 
fishing, as it was struggling in the river, having, I suppose, fallen 
from some tree or bush, or perhaps failed in an attempt to fly across 
the stream. Both the Great and Lesser Spotted Woedpeckers 
have bred in the woods by the side of the Tamar this season. 
Swifts were exceedingly plentiful, and I observed some feeding 
their young in the holes of an old pillar or high stone wall, 
intended for a kind of railway viaduct. Sand Martins, too, again 
occupied holes in the banks of the Tamar, the only breeding 
locality for them that I am aware of anywhere within many miles 
of Plymouth. Strange to say about a dozen Swifts were lately 
captured by taking the artificial flies of fishermen on the River 
Dart, an incident which has been immortalised by Bewick in one 
of his vignettes. A fine Shag which I examined was in perfect 
breeding plumage, with the exception of the curved crest, which 
is usually lost by the middle of June; but I have seen old birds 
with a fine, glossy, greenish black and bronzed plumage in the 
middle of winter. 
In my last notes I mentioned having visited a small heronry 
near St. Germains. I have since been informed by a clergyman 
living in the locality, that with the aid of a long ladder he once 
endeavoured to look into one of the nests, but the instant his face 
appeared on a level with the edge a young bird made a sudden and. 
vicious thrust straight at his eye, in evading which he nearly fell 
headlong from the tree. 
On July 4th Blackcaps and Garden Warblers were still singing 
in the woods by the side of the Tamar, whilst large families of 
Blue and Cole Tits were already flitting from tree to tree, swinging 
and hanging from the branches in every conceivable posture, the 
parents assiduously attending to the wants of their young. 
The young Gulls at Wembury were by this time for the most 
part fledged, though some were still in the down. A large colony 
of Martins were nesting on the face of the cliffs, and it was very 
curious to see them when flying past make a dash at the small 
feathers or particles of down which came from the Gulls, as if they 
were insects. A Herring Gull has for many years been in the 
