Tue ZooLocist—OcrToseEr, 1876. 5125 
and the female “ poult,” or “heath poult,” and some of them seem totally 
ignorant that they are the two sexes of the same species ; in fact, I remember 
a man once bringing a female to me, with the remark that he had got a 
queer hen pheasant with a short tail, and thought it would be a valuable 
novelty. ‘‘ Within the memory of man,” to use a much hackneyed phrase, 
the species has become comparatively rare, and will, I fear, eventually be 
‘a thing of the past” in the grand old forest, whose natural beauties are 
replete with pleasure and profit to any thinking mind.—G. B. Corbin. 
Redlegged Partridge sitting on a Gate—A farmer told me that a few 
days ago he heard a great noise proceeding from an adjacent enclosure: 
on reaching the place he saw what he took to be a hen partridge standing 
on a, gate calling its young together out of reach of danger; but on creeping 
up quite close he was surprised to see that it was an old male French 
partridge calling lustily. I remember once seeing in Lincolnshire a 
partridge standing on the top of a haycock calling as loud as he could.— 
C. Matthew Prior. 
Common Dotterel near Penzance.—I think it well just to note the occur- 
rence of the dotterel in this neighbourhood, because we are very seldom 
visited by it: it is a species, I believe, that occurs far more frequently in 
the south-eastern districts than the south-west. Now and then, and at 
uncertain intervals, we hear of a specimen or s0 in our open moors and 
fallows. The example I examined last week was, I believe, solitary on a 
hill or slope running up from Mount’s Bay to no great elevation. It appears 
to be a bird in adult plumage, with a few of the feathers on the back 
bordered with rust-colour—perhaps indicative of winter plumage, as the rest 
of the plumage shows no sign of its being a bird of the year—Z. H. Rodd; 
Penzance, August 29, 1876. 
Green Sandpiper at Northrepps.—In my note on the occurrence of the 
green sandpiper rather a curious misprint occurs: “of knot” should be 
“‘oftenest”—yrather a perplexing mistake, as ornithologists do not, in a 
general way, consider the green sandpiper to be a “species of knot” (S. 8. 
5083). I saw the same bird or another one in just the same place a few 
days afterwards, and this time it did utter a note upon being flushed.— 
J. H. Gurney, jun.; Calais. 
Curious Habit of the Common Sandpiper._In the August number of 
' the ‘ Zoologist’ (S. S. 5081) is an account of a curious habit of the common 
sandpiper by Mr. H. M. Wallis, who asks if any one has observed a similar 
trait in the same species. I once had the pleasure.of observing something 
of the kind. It was early in April, while angling in the Petteril, near 
Carlisle, when, for the first time that year, I noticed a common sandpiper, 
which was sitting on a bed of gravel near the brink of the river. As 
I approached it flew across to the opposite side, and sat down on a stump of 
the weiring made to defend the bank of the pool, which is deep, and the 
SECOND SERIES—VOL, XI, 3E 
