NOTES FROM NORTHAMPTONSHIRE. 461 



to me, which had been caught by one wing in a common vermin- 

 trap set for a cat or stoat near Thorpe. 



June 28th. One of our gamekeepers brought me four eggs 

 taken from a nest of the common Grey Partridge, in which ten 

 young birds were hatched a few days ago ; two of these four were 

 of the normal colour, but rather smaller than an average-sized 

 Blackbird's egg ; the other two — much more green in colour, but 

 of about the same dimensions — had each a sort of horn or spout at 

 the centres of their thick ends. These appendages appeared to 

 be a sort of prolongation of the shell, and were hollow, filled with 

 indurated matter, some of which projected slightly from their 

 exposed ends. I never saw any eggs at all resembling these 

 monstrosities ; but Professor A. Newton, to whom I sent them, 

 informs me that he has met with a closely similar deformity in a 

 Pheasant's egg. A Robin's nest was found on the wall of our 

 engine-house containing three pure white eggs. This aberration 

 from the normal type in eggs of this species seems to be by no 

 means uncommon in our neighbourhood. 



July 8th. Mr. Hunt picked up an old male Lesser Spotted 

 Woodpecker in his garden at Wadenhoe, evidently killed by flying 

 against wire-fencing. 



July 10th. My falconer went to look at a nest of Pied Wood- 

 peckers, with a view of taking a young one or two to rear, but 

 found that the birds had left the breeding-hole, and one of the 

 young was lying fully fledged, but draggled to death, at the foot 

 of the oak in which it had been born. A Nightingale reported in 

 full song this morning near our entrance-lodges. 



July 14th. First Green Sandpiper of the season seen near 

 Wadenhoe Woods. 



July 19th. A good specimen of the Black Tern was shot on 

 our river, near Aldwinkle, and brought to me. For some time 

 before and after this date, I received many reports of one — and 

 now and then two — Hobbies seen near our park-lodge ; but the 

 weather was so incessantly wet and boisterous that no one could 

 discover the nest of these birds, which I have no doubt might 

 have been found within a mile of the house at Lilford in more 

 favourable weather. A Peregrine or two were often seen near 

 Lilford throughout the summer, and are still (October) about the 

 neighbourhood. 



July 25th. A vast influx of Books noticed. These birds have 



