NOTES AND QUERIES. 187 
watches the approach of the Pigeons from the north, and as soon as they 
are in view throws his hawk in the air, on sight of which they dive down 
through the gorge, where they are netted. One may judge of the numbers 
taken by seeing the markets full of them, and these “ Palombiéres ” are a 
valuable’possession to their owners. lesides, wherever there are high trees, 
which the Pigeons frequent for roosting, there are huts built high among 
the branches, from which they are shot. I will conclude this with a list of 
birds that I took down from a poulterer and game-dealer’s shop in Rome :— 
Blackbird, Thrush, Linnet, Goldfinch, Robin, Blue Tit, Greenfinch, Haw- 
finch, Jackdaw, Peewit, Sparrowhawk, Nightjar, Redwing, Blackcap, Red- 
legged Partridge, Grey Partridge, Jay, Magpie, Siskin, Lark, Wild Goose, 
Mallard, Teal, Shoveller, Pintail Duck, and Little Bustard. Besides birds, 
I saw Hare, Roe-deer, Wild Boar, and Porcupine.—E. C. Mrrrorp. 
[Cy. Waterton’s account of the Bird-market of Rome.—Ep.} 
Early nesting of the Goldcrest.—On March 24th I had a nest of 
the Golderest brought to me in a dead branch of a furze bush that had 
grown long and straggling in a wood facing the south: it contained seven 
eggs, showing no evidence of incubation, but the yolk in each adhering to 
the side, as if they had been some time laid. The finder informed me that 
when he discovered the nest, on the 14th, it contained four eggs ; that on the 
20th there were seven, and that the bird was sitting on this number when he 
took it on the 24th. As we had frost on the night of the 19th, followed 
by cold wind from the north, it is probable that the vitality of the eggs was 
then destroyed. I have never hitherto known Goldcrests to breed before 
the latter half of April, and May and June are the most usual months.— 
R. J. Ussuer (Cappagh, Co. Waterford). 
Shoveller nesting in Cumberland.—In his ‘Illustrated Manual of 
British Birds’ Mr. Howard Saunders states, of the Shoveller, that 
“ probably a few pairs inhabit the marshes on the Cumberland side of the 
Solway, inasmuch as the bird is known to nest in Kirkcudbrightshire.” Mr. 
Saunders has forgotten that in 1886 I recorded a nest of the Shoveller 
taken on the Cumbrian Solway in ‘The Naturalist,’ describing also the 
young in down. In 1887 we again obtained a nest, and, though none was 
found in 1888, the old birds bred, and young ones were shot on the marshes 
with the first days of August. The case is really stronger for us than for 
the Scottish Solway, because the Scottish evidence rests only on young 
birds shot when feathered, while we have found the nest twice, and obtained 
feathered young on several occasions. In fact the Shoveller nests with us 
in two localities, twelve miles at least apart— H. A. Macruerson (Carlisle). 
FISHES. 
A Rare Fish on the Norfolk Coast.—I am indebted to Mr. Arthur 
Patterson, of Yarmouth, for a specimen of a beautiful little fish, Scopelus 
