OCCASIONAL NOTES. 211 
the skaters, seeking open water where there was none. The Dabchick’s 
hole was frozen; two were gone; the other two were squatting helplessly 
on the ice. I chased them into the reeds and caught one of them. Placed 
in a large glass-bowl it proved a most amusing diver, but as I had no 
minnows to feed it on, I sent it to the Zoological Gardens, where it soon 
died in the Fish-house. Jts shyness was extreme, and it would often dive 
with such a quick start as to throw sprays of water seven or eight feet. In 
this respect it was very unlike a Sclavonian Grebe which was caught on 
the shore near Cromer on the 27th, and taken alive to my father’s, where 
it was put into a bath with plenty of water, and which, either from 
exhaustion or a contented disposition, was as tame as the other bird was 
wild. The late Mr. Gould, in his ‘ Birds of Great Britain,’ represents the 
inner circle of the eye of the Sclayonian Grebe as white, as do several 
other authorities, but in our bird, when alive, it was golden yellow. The 
Hawfinch turned up again at Gatton on the 11th February, apparently 
after the crumbs which had been put out to feed the small birds, as it 
approached close to the window. I remember, when at school at Braconash, 
in Norfolk, a Hawfinch which came very close to the window while the boys 
were at breakfast. Yet in nearly all works on Ornithology the Hawfinch 
is rightly accredited with being one of the shyest of birds. On the 26th, 
on going down to the lake, I immediately discovered a stranger, which was 
soon identified as a female Goosander. 1880 has been quite a winter for 
this species and the Smew. It was very agile and beautiful when swimming 
with one or two Coots abreast on either side of it, but looked droll enough 
squatting among some dead reeds by the side of the lake. I heard of it 
long after my departure, and believe that it remained there until April.— 
J. H. Gurney, Jun. (Northrepps, Norwich). 
Roveu-Leccnp Buzzarp anD Hen Harrier 1n Surrey.—Last 
month I announced the capture of the Rough-legged Buzzard in Surrey, 
and stated in my note that I was informed the male bird had been trapped 
a short time previously. Since writing I have seen the supposed male, and 
find it to be the male of the Hen Harrier, the companion to which was 
trapped by Mr. Lambert's keeper in the same neighbourhood a short time 
since. I have now seen all three birds, and they are a female Rough- 
legged Buzzard and a pair of Hen Harriers, birds of the year, all trapped 
during the past winter in the neighbourhood of Chelsham, Surrey.— Pariip 
Crowey (Waddon House, Croydon). 
OrnirHotocicaL Norges FRoM OxFoRDSHIRE. — Early in December 
last a Shag was shot whilst sitting on the ridge of a barn roof at Souldern. 
A female Goldeneye was procured on the canal on the 18th January, and 
on the 24th of the same month a Grey Crow was picked up near Banbury 
in a starving condition and brought to Mr. Wyatt, the Banbury birdstufter, 
