3384 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
Length of head, 4 in.; of neck and body, 11% in.; of tail (including hair- 
point), 8 in. They had, I think, increased nearly two inches in total length 
in the nineteen days between their arrival and the date of taking the 
measurement, of which increase fully an inch belongs to the tail. Those of 
the authors I have looked up who assign a date for the time of birth of the 
young, give April or May; but I should think from their size that these 
cubs must have been born three months, which brings the time to the 
beginning of April or the end of March, though of course it is impossible 
to speak positively without considerable experience with the young of the 
species, and the rate of growth would also depend largely on the feed. This 
date, however, agrees with that in the instance recorded by Mr. Parker, as 
the young would no doubt be blind for at least four weeks. On July Sth 
I found that both cubs had got their permanent incisors in the upper jaw; 
one has cut both upper permanent canines; the other cub has one upper 
canine just showing through the gum. Both cubs retain their four milk 
canines. The remaining teeth in the upper jaw, and all the lower jaw, are 
of the deciduous set. Both the cubs are males—ALFRED HeNnEAGE Cocks 
(Great Marlow, Bucks). 
Soory SHEARWATER OBTAINED IN InELAND.—Through the good offices 
of my friend Mr. J.C. Neligan, of Tralee, I have lately had the opportunity 
of examining a specimen of the Sooty Shearwater (Puffinus griseus, Gmel.), 
which was killed many years ago off the Little Skellig rock, on the coast of 
Kerry, and has since been preserved in the collection of Mr, R. B. Chute, 
of Chute Hall, to whom I feel much indebted for his kindness in allowing 
this valuable specimen to be brought to Dublin. ‘This is the bird which 
was first described as British by Mr. Arthur Strickland, in 1832, under 
the name of Puffinus fuliginosus, from a specimen shot at the mouth of the 
Tees; and which has been treated as the young or female of the Great 
Shearwater (P. major, Faber) by many of our best authorities. But, in his 
‘ Birds of Europe,’ Mr. Dresser identifies it with P. griseus of Gmelin, and 
considers it a species distinct from P. major. Though both birds are 
rare on the British coasts, P. griseus appears to be much the scarcer of the 
two, and has not hitherto been recorded as Irish.—A. G. Morr (Museum 
of Science and Art, Dublin). 
ON THE REPORTED OCCURRENCE IN ENGLAND OF THE AMERICAN 
Pizp-BILLED GReBE.—At a meeting of the Zoological Society on the 21st 
June last, Mr. R. B. Sharpe exhibited a specimen of Podilymbus podiceps, 
stated to have been killed at Radipole, near Weymouth, in the winter of 
1880-81. Such an occurrence is highly improbable, not only from what is 
known of the habits of this bird,—which, although common in North, 
Central, and some parts of South America, has never, so far as I am 
