MEMOIR OF THE LATE FREDERICK BOND. 409 
search, and under his tuition I quickly learned to distinguish all 
our commoner birds by their notes, flight, or peculiar actions, 
and many of the more conspicuous insects. I had commenced 
making a collection of birds’ eggs at school, a collection which 
was afterwards often added to by my kind friend and mentor. 
And how cherished were those specimens of ‘ British taken’ 
rarities! Then, having learnt to skin under his direction 
(beginning with a Starling), I commenced to collect birds, and in 
this he often helped me, either by giving me duplicates, or by 
shooting birds for me, and sending them to me ‘in the flesh.’ 
Many a time a servant would arrive with a small parcel and a 
message ‘ Mr. Bond’s kind regards, and he thought perhaps you 
might like this.’ The parcel being tenderly unfolded, displayed 
perhaps a Hawfinch, or a Green Sandpiper, shot at our brook. 
** Kingsbury Reservoir was our happy hunting-ground, and in 
those days (twenty or five-and-twenty years ago) it was a paradise 
for an ornithologist. There was no railway-viaduct at one end 
of it then, as now; the extension of the Midland line to Bedford 
had not been commenced. When we visited London we had to 
drive our own horses, or go by one of the two coaches which 
were then on the road, one of them going to and from St. Alban’s, 
the other to Stanmore and Elstree. It was no uncommon thing, 
as we crossed the two bridges over the reservoir, and the Hyde 
water, to see Wild Ducks there, and Gulls and Terns flying 
about at the period of their migration in spring and autumn. 
About the end of April and beginning of May, and again in 
August to about the middle of September, the number and 
variety of wading birds which visited this fine sheet of water 
were most remarkable. Plovers and Sandpipers, Snipe and 
Jack Snipe, were all there in their proper season, and there were 
always afew Herons about, which came either from Osterley Park, 
Black Park, Uxbridge, or Wanstead Park in Essex. The water 
was very little disturbed then by human visitors, and we have 
many a time walked round it, about two miles, and followed the 
Brent towards Hendon, or in the other direction towards Brent- 
ford, without meeting anyone but farm-labourers, or perhaps one 
or two anglers. Here in the early morning might be heard the 
note of the Ringed Plover as it ran along the shingle at the head 
of the Reservoir, or the musical cry of the high-flying Redshank 
which we marked down, to be stalked and shot. On the muddy 
