NOTES FROM NORFOLK AND SUFFOLK. 481 
than the males. Their food consisted of aquatic insects and 
vegetable matter. On the 28rd of May a nest of seven fresh 
laid eggs were brought me from Hickling; and a live bird on 
the 28th of October that had been caught in a marsh drain 
leading into the Wensum near Norwich. It was apparently a 
male, and had eyes of a brick-red colour. 
An adult Great Black-backed Gull was caught at Cromer by 
being entangled in some fishing gear, and was brought to me 
alive on December 16th, 1884. The irides were grey, speckled 
with fine irregular blotches of brown; the eyelids were of a 
beautiful reddish orange ; gape of mouth same colour, but not 
quite so deep in tone. The upper mandible was yellow on the 
anterior half, pale horn on the basal half; lower mandible horn- 
colour, with fleshy tinge, with the red patch covering the 
anterior half at the sides, extreme tip pale horn-colour ; legs, 
pale flesh colour, with a slight tinge of pmk on the front of the 
tarsus. 
Two small examples of the Bittern came to hand in January. 
The first, a male, was shot on the 19th at Aylsham by Mr. 
Purdy. It seemed very tame, allowing the shooter to approach 
within twenty-five yards of it before it took wing. It was 
very fat, and the stomach contained the remains of a water- 
beetle (Dytiscus marginalis), which, judging from previous dis- 
sections, seems a favourite prey. The second example, a female 
(also of smaller dimensions than usual) was killed near Lynn on 
the 26th. It weighed just 18 ounces, and measured 264 inches 
in total length, beak and tail included; 45} inches across the 
fully extended wings, and 12} in the wing from carpus. 
Solitary individuals of the handsome Greenbacked Porphyrio, 
Porphyrio chloronotus, have been met with in Norfolk on five 
different occasions (see Mr. J. H. Gurney’s note on the subject, 
antea, p. 71), and four out of the five were sent to me for 
preservation. The last procured (Zool. 1885, p. 482) was shot 
on October 16th, 1885, on the River Bure, near Horning, as it 
rose out of some reeds near one of the entrances to Hoveton 
Broad. 
ZOOLOGIST.—DECEMBER, 1886. 20 
