128 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
Bramblings, Fringilla montifringilla, sang out jubilantly from 
their favourite fir-tops. A nest of this finch, taken on June 28th 
from a spruce-fir, contained seven eggs. ‘The materials included 
fresh moss and fine stems of grass, trimmed with grey lichens, 
and quilted inside with feathers (among which we recognised with 
pleasure some feathers of the Nutcracker, the only intimation we 
had of its presence in the neighbourhood). Another common bird 
was the Reed Bunting. Magpies nested near our quarters, and 
visited us daily for scraps, an office in which the Hooded Crows, 
being early abroad, frequently forestalled them. The Cuckoo and 
Swift were likewise present. Once I picked up some feathers of 
a Snowy Owl, but we never saw or heard any Owls, nor did the 
Kite or Rough-legged Buzzard ever cross our path. The Merlin 
was fairly common, and I was interested to find one sitting on 
her eggs in a spruce-fir, about thirty feet from the ground. I shot 
her off the nest for identification. Her eggs were fresh, and the 
nest appeared to be that of a Hooded Crow. 
Desiring to obtain eggs of the Osprey, I visited two eyries 
that were tenanted and several old ones; but no eggs were to be 
had, though I gave up much time and trouble in an attempt to 
secure them. One of the nests I photographed. In both of those 
in repair the old Ospreys had chosen to build on spruce-firs, the 
tops of which had been broken off previously, thus forming a 
natural platform for the compact pile of strong and interlaced 
sticks of which the nest was composed. In this part of the 
country, fish being difficult to obtain in abundance until the end 
of July, the Ospreys breed late, in order to cater the better for 
their young; our boatman had once taken young Ospreys out of 
an eyrie in August. 
The Tetraonide of the district are Hazel Grouse, Capercaillie, 
Black-game, and Willow Grouse, regarding the first of which we 
learnt nothing new. Capercaillie nested freely in the district, and 
I often saw their droppings. Black-game preferred the islands, 
on one of which I disturbed a grey hen sitting on six eggs. For 
Willow Grouse the likeliest ground was upon the verge of the 
forest. The only eggs of the Willow Grouse that I obtained agree 
pretty closely in colour with a common reddish variety of Lagopus 
scoticus, but are decidedly smaller and in shape less spherical. 
Fishing occupied so much of our time, as to afford con- 
siderable facility for observations on such wildfowl as tenanted 
