16 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



I had a short-lived false alarm here, a gentleman telling me he had seen a 

 Beaver-skin in Ostersund last winter. On pursuing my search to head- 

 quarters, I found that it was nothing more than one of the ordinary stock 

 of American furs in a furrier's shop ! Of course, merely travelling through 

 a district is a very different thing from thoroughly searching it ; but, 

 though so many people outside Jemtland were confident that Beavers existed 

 therein, yet no one in the province with whom I conversed held out 

 the slightest hope of such a thing ; and, though I am very far from being 

 in a position to assert positively that no Beaver exists at the present time 

 in Sweden (and should be very glad to find myself entirely wrong), yet 

 I cannot help being now extremely doubtful about it. In Jemtland I was 

 generally referred to a certain other province, which I hope to visit some 

 day, but do not at all expect my wish to find Beavers there realised. 

 Besides these localities, I naturally heard occasionally of some other locality 

 where Beavers were supposed by my informant to exist; but further 

 inquiries in each case satisfied me that such was no longer the case. — 

 Alfred Heneage Cocks (Great Marlow, Bucks). 



Uncommon Bat near Dublin. — On the 22nd June last, at half-past 

 ten in the morniug, I saw a large black Bat hawking for flies over the 

 River Dodder, near Miltown Bridge. The sun was shining brightly at the 

 time, and, as I watched it from the bridge, it frequently came quite close, 

 sometimes above, sometimes beneath me. Its ears seemed short. From 

 its dark colour I saw it was not the Noctule, which, from its size, I thought 

 it might be when I first noticed it. It was in company with numbers of 

 Swifts and Swallows. My friend Mr. More, of the Dublin Museum, who 

 is familiar with the Serotine, agrees with me that it might perhaps have 

 been that Bat, which, I believe, has not yet been noticed in Ireland. — Percy 

 E. Freke (Rosemount, Dundrum, Dublin). 



[The Serotine can hardly be described as black, or eveu dark-coloured. 

 It is perhaps more likely to have been Leisler's Bat, which has already been 

 noted in Ireland. See Zool. 1874, pp. 4071, 4236 ; and 1875, pp. 4419, 

 4532.— Ed.] 



Ornithological Notes from Northamptonshire. — Mr. W. Tomalin, 

 of Northampton, informed me by letter that he shot a Rough-legged 

 Buzzard, Buteo lagopus, at Weston Favell, October 5th, 1881, and has 

 recorded this occurrence in the 'Field' of October 15th. A Great Grey 

 Shrike, Lmiius excubitor, was shot by my friend Mr. George Hunt near 

 Thorpe Waterville, November 1st, 1881, and sent to me in the flesh; this 

 specimen is a female, and I think a young bird of the year. A Ruff, 

 Machetes pugnax, was shot by my gamekeeper in a meadow near Pitch- 

 marsh, November 2nd, 1881, and sent to me. I consider this fact worthy 



