NOTES AND QUERIES. 253 



called out that he had marked a Chough to her nest below. I descended a 

 sheer cliff ou my rope, some eighty feet or upwards, when I reached another 

 cliff at right angles to the first. Between the two was a narrow fissure, 

 closed above by blocks and earth, and having a smaller block lodged in its 

 mouth, leaving a very small opening. Through this I could just descry 

 the nest high up at the back of the fissure. I had then to dislodge the 

 block in the jaws of the fissure, and while I was thus engaged the Chough 

 flew almost in my face, with her shrill scream, diving out beneath me. 

 I then had to lodge myself sideways in the narrow fissure, depending on 

 the sides alone, like a sweep in a chimney. At last I wriggled within 

 arm's length of the nest, which contained but two eggs, one hard set and 

 the other becoming addled. It was composed of materials similar to the 

 nest above described, but had not the mop arrangement. Another nest, to 

 which .my gamekeeper descended on May 9th, contained also but two eggs, 

 partially incubated, and was also in a crevice, into which he had to creep 

 up, the rope being slackened, alter Ins having descended a considerable 

 cliff. Among the lining of cow's-hair was a rag of black worsted binding. 

 These pairs of Choughs having stopped laying after producing but two 

 eggs surprise me. I hope this does not indicate approaching sterility. The 

 eggs of this species were formerly obtained with much greater ease. Two 

 fishermen brought me twenty-two of them from the same locality in the 

 year 185(5, among which is an egg still in my possession, the ground colour 

 of which is pure white, and its only markings are pale ash-coloured specks 

 It is, however, an undoubted Chough's egg. Choughs used, as stated to 

 me by an old resident on the coast, to breed, as long as he could remember, 

 in much lower caves than they now select; and some of the spots pointed 

 out to me as having contained their nests could be reached without ladder 

 or rope. As they have become scarcer they have also become wary, and, 

 happily for them, climbers are not to be found now among the peasantry 

 here. It is hard therefore to account for the diminution in this species. 

 May it be long ere the shrill cry of the Chough ceases to be heard among 

 the Waterford cliffs, while the eye follows its graceful, buoyant flight. 

 Now, closing its wings, the bird seems dropping into the sea, when, 

 suddenly spreading them again, it rises with its peculiar scream, its com- 

 panion dropping as it rises, and vice versa, Thus a pair of Choughs may 

 be distinguished at a great distance by their peculiar flight. Their food 

 seems to be chiefly small insects, which their fine-pointed bills are suited 

 to take up. They delight in an ant-hill, and I have found a caterpillar 

 in the stomach of a Chough. In Irish the Chough is called " Cawg." 

 They are otherwise called here " Redshanks" or " Redbills."— Richakd°J. 

 Ussheb (Cappagh). 



The Ortolan Bunting in Lincolnshire.— On the afternoon of May 3rd, 

 when walking across a newly-sown field of oats near the Humber, I noticed 



