THE ZooLocist—APRIL, 1876. 4859 
nearly six weeks, and though hunted all that time had eluded all 
attempts to shoot her: at last she was trapped, the trap being 
baited with a rabbit. One of the keepers declared that he got 
several partridges one day in consequence of her flying about 
overhead. The dimensions of this specimen are as follows :— 
Length, twenty-two inches and a half; expanse of wings when full 
spread, four feet seven inches and a half; from the carpal joint to 
the end of the fourth feather (the longest in the wing), seventeen 
inches; tail, nine inches and a quarter; the wings when closed 
reach a little beyond the tail. As to the plumage, which is 
altogether very dirty, I have carefully read what Professor Newton 
says, in his edition of Yarrell, and have come to the conclusion 
that it is a bird of the second year: the general markings are more 
like his description of the adult than the young bird; but the iris 
in this specimen is straw-coloured, thickly sprinkled with minute 
gray spots; the ear-coverts are nearly uniform grayish white; there 
is scarcely any trace of fawn on any part except the tibie and 
tarsi; the long feathers of the former are, in front, streaked down 
the shaft, aud have two diamond-shaped brown spots; the re- 
mainder are irregularly barred with brown; the tarsi is marked 
with oblong brown spots; there is a new feather in the tail not 
quite grown—about half an inch short—in which the broad distal 
bar has an irregular fawn-coloured spot in each web, passing out- 
wards into grayish brown, almost making another bar; this feather 
is deeply tinged with fawn and tipped with the same: the upper 
tail-coverts have two brown bars, except the two centre feathers, 
which have only a large spot of brown near the tip. The stomach 
of this bird contained the remains of a rat. 
Scarcity of Birds——On the 24th I went to the sea-shore and 
stayed about an hour without seeing a bird of any kind. I went 
again to the sea on the 25th, and walked seven miles along the 
beach, and only saw a few herring gulls, a small flock of ring 
plovers, and a young glaucous gull. I have never known so few 
birds about as at present: the fineness of the weather may have 
something to do with it—it is just like spring here. I heard the 
song of the missel thrush in different parts of the Dene on the 
27th. 
FEBRUARY. 
Spring Birds.—Chaflinch singing on the Ist. A good many song 
thrushes had returned by the 4th. Great tit singing on the 9th. 
