NOTES AND QUERIES. 153 



The alleged existence of Ptarmigan in Cumberland.— In his 

 excelleut article on the distribution of the Ptarmigan (pp. 81 — 89), Mr. 

 Robert Service goes out of his wa}' to try to prove that this species was 

 once a native of the English Lake District. The only shred of evidence 

 adduced is an incidental remark, apparently founded on oral tradition, that 

 two young Ptarmigan had been obtained in England, together with the 

 vague inference that they might have come from Skiddaw. Mr. Service 

 appears to forget that the enquiries instituted by Capt. K. Dover, on behalf 

 of Mr. A. G. More, were made among the men best qualified to know the 

 fauna of the lakes, and that he failed to find any evidence or tradition of 

 their former presence. More recently the subject was investigated afresh 

 by the writer and his colleague, when preparing ' The Birds of Cumber- 

 land,' witb a similar result. Certainly no one was better qualified to know 

 than Jerry Smith, of Bassenthwaite, who died last year. A native of the 

 district, a keeper by calling, a naturalist con amove, and latterly stuflBug birds 

 and mounting "pads" for all the country side, — possessed, too, of a reserved 

 disposition, together with a retentive memory, — Jerry Smith possessed the 

 most intimate knowledge of the fauna of the Skiddaw district, and to such 

 congenial spirits as Mr. Senhouse, Mr. Duckworth, and the writer, he was 

 wilhng to unburden himself freely. The question about Ptarmigan was 

 put to him again and again, but he always maintained that the alleged 

 existence of the species was purely imaginary, though he himself was well 

 acquainted with the bird, and recollected the introduction of some from 

 Scotland. He also informed the writer that he had, as a boy, heard old men 

 say that a few Capercailzie e.xisted in the district. — H. A. Macpherson. 



Supposed occurrence formerly of Ptarmigan in Cumberland.— With 

 reference to the remarks on this subject by Mr. Service (pp. 81 — 89), 

 I may state that in 1841 there was in the Museum at Keswick a Ptarmigan 

 said to have been killed on Skiddaw ; but I remember no other particulars. 

 — H. T. Frere (Burston Piectory, Dissj. [Those on Skiddaw were intro- 

 duced from Scotland. Vide supra. — Ed.] 



The Hawfinch at Harrogate. — On February 2oth J saw a pair of 

 Hawfinches, C'occothraustes vulgaris, in the Hydropathic Gardens. This 

 is, I think, a very unusual place for this bird, but a few have been seen in 

 several places in the town this winter. During the last summer a pair 

 bred in the grounds at Ripley Castle. I communicated this to Mr. W. 

 Eagle Clarke, who wrote me in reply that he knew of a pair nesting at 

 Panuel, near Harrogate, during the previous year. During the last week of 

 February Mr. Basil T. Woodd, of Conyngham Hall, wrote me that last 

 winter several Hawfinches used to come and feed on the crumbs thrown 

 out of his window for the bird, and that he had reason to believe that some 

 of them nested in his grounds. — F. R. Fitzgerald (Harrogate). 



ZOOLOGIST.— APRIL, 1857. N 



