128 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
one day brought him this Purple Gallinule perfectly uninjured. It was 
kept alive for several days, but would not touch any food that was given 
to it, and was very fierce when any one approached it; it was, therefore, 
killed and sent to be stuffed. In a case adjoining the one which contained 
the Purple Gallinule was an Egyptian Goose, which had also been secured 
by the sheep-dog in one of Mr. Burrow’s fields; but this was a wounded 
bird. I noticed that the country about Badgworth, and indeed the whole 
of the extensive flat between the Mendip and Brent Knoll, is intersected 
by numerous dykes, most of which are arched over by a tangled growth of 
bushes, and thus would form a safe retreat for Coots, Moorhens, &c., so 
that the Purple Gallinule may have been for some time inhabiting the 
district before it was captured by the sheep-dog on August 25th, 1875. 
Having heard a report that a farmer living on the flat had, not long 
since, shot a Crane, I called on him to gather what information he 
could give on the matter. The Great Western Railway runs through the 
great Mid Somerset level, and where it is crossed by lanes these approach 
it by artificially constructed mounds supporting the bridges over the line, 
locally termed “tips.” All the bridges, lanes, and tips are precisely alike, 
and it was with some difficulty, and not until after one or two blunders, 
that I at last obtained the “ correct tip,” which brought me to Wick Farm, 
in the parish of South Brent, the abode of Mr. William Harris, who was 
reported to have shot the Crane. Finding him at home, I received from 
him the following information :—One evening in May, 1875, just as it was 
getting dusk, he saw a large bird alight in a field near his house. He 
went home for his gun, and returning found the bird in the same place, 
and succeeded in getting near enough to shoot it. It was very different 
to what we call the Common Crane, he said (meaning the Common 
Heron), and was altogether a strange-looking bird. The top of its head 
was red, and the feathers of its tail were like those of a cock; and he 
proceeded to give me a very good description of an adult Grus communis. 
Asked what he had done with the bird, he replied that not knowing it was 
of any value he had given it to his labourers, and that since then some of 
his neighbours had very much blamed him for not having had the bird 
preserved. That the cold weather which set in at the beginning of 
December would be of some continuance was announced in West Somerset 
not so much by the arrival beforehand, in greater numbers, of migratory 
birds from the north, as by the departure of nearly all the small birds 
that were with us at the time. Most of the Fieldfares, Redwings, Starlings, 
Finches, Blackbirds and Thrushes left us, and it was quite strange to 
wander over the fields and through the woods and to find them almost 
entirely deserted by birds. In a long day’s shooting in a well-wooded 
district | only noticed three Blackbirds and one or two Robins, and did not 
see a single other small bird. The great majority had doubtless sought 
