OCCASIOXAL NOTES. 353 



eighteen inches or two feet, which they ran up as we approached. It seems 

 to me a most extraordinary freak for a bird which usually builds on trees or 

 ledges of rock to construct a nest on the ground in the middle of the fen, 

 when a flight of less than two miles (which would be as nothing to it) would 

 have taken it to abundance of trees. Rather curiously this nest was within 

 a few yards of where, last year, I discovered a young Short-eared Owl, and 

 of course I set it down as an Owl's nest at the moment of finding it. — R. 

 M. Christy (Saffron Walden). 



Curious Nesting-place of a Great Tit. — A few yards from the 

 house my brother deposited a dead Rat and also a Hedgehog to skeletonise, 

 and placed over them a large inverted flower-pot. Through the drainage- 

 hole at the top a Great Tit found its way, and formed a perfect platform of 

 wool, hair, &c, over the carcasses of the two beasts, whilst at one side she made 

 her nest* and actually lined it with the hair of the defuuct Hedgehog. — 

 J. Rackhouse, Jun. (West Rauk, York). 



Pintail breeding in Westmoreland. — On July the 29th, while 

 visiting the beautiful garden belonging to Miss Meyer, at Low Wood, near 

 Ambleside, I was much gratified by seeing a pair of young Pintail Ducks 

 [Dafila acuta), which had been reared upon the pond last year. The brood 

 numbered six in all, I think, and got off successfully. At first, from Miss 

 Meyer's account, the young birds left the grounds where they were reared, 

 and joined some Wild Ducks on Windermere, but after a while they all 

 returned to the pond with the parent bird. This is the first and only time 

 that Miss Meyer has had them breeding, I believe, though other commoner 

 kinds have nested there, notwithstanding that it is close to the main coach- 

 road between Windermere and Ambleside. — J. Rackhouse, Jun. (West 

 Rank, York). 



[We have received gratifying intelligence of the successful nesting in 

 various counties of several of the less common ducks during the past breeding 

 season, the result, it may be assumed, of the strict observance of the close- 

 time. — Ed.] 



Phycis blennoides (Gunther) off the Manx Coast. — On the 8th 

 July last I received a specimen of this fish, for which I am indebted to Mr. 

 Rragg, of Ramsey, in one of whose boats it was caught. It had beeu taken 

 on a " long line " baited for Conger, some miles to the north-west of Peel, 

 and in about eighty fathoms of water. I had heard of some caught during 

 the last two weeks of June, and had seen a dried specimen on the 26th. From 

 all I can learn it appears never before to have been seen in these waters, 

 and is unknown alike to the fishermen and fish-dealers, who have as yet no 

 name for it. One man, however, tells me that about the same season and 

 place last year four were taken in his boat. Throughout July it has 



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