NORTHERN NEWS. 
The Journal of the Board of Agriculture for May, contains a report 
on the Food of the Rook, Starling and Chaffinch. 
We note the death of Charles Stonham, whose work on the Birds of © 
the British Islands, 5 vols., was issued a few years ago. a 
The Board of Agriculture and Fisheries has issued a pamphlet on 
“Weeds and their Suppression,’ as leaflet number 112. 
The 25th Annual Report of the Royal Soctety for the Protection of Birds 
contains an excellent record of the work done during the year by that 
useful Society. 
The death is announced of Professor Silvanus Phillips Thompson, 
D.Sc.,, BUR.S:,;, B.A: (Lond) Hon, M.D) ELsD. whojwas, bor) atwYork 
in 1851, of Quaker parentage. 
The Report of the British Association for 1915 (Manchester Meeting), 
was received in the middle of June, and occupies more than 1,000 pages. 
It contains the usual valuable record of this great Scientific Conference. 
It will be remembered that Sir William Turner, the well-known 
anatomist and Principal of the Edinburgh University, recently died. 
Oddly enough his successor, Sir James Alfred Ewing, was a ‘ director of 
naval education.’ 
The death is announced at Shirley, Rusholme, of Mr. J. Howard Reed, 
at the age of 57 years. He was well known in geographical circles in 
Manchester, and was for many years connected with the Manchester 
Geographical Society. 
At a recent sale of the collection of F. H. and A. E. Waterhouse two 
examples of Euvanessa antiopa, taken in Yorkshire, fetched 22s. each, 
whereas another specimen believed to have been taken in Suffolk, with 
other species, only realised 3s. 
Illustrating some ‘ Notes on an Excavation in the Wilderness,’ by 
C. J. Alsop in the Report of the Marlborough College Natural History 
Society, No. 64, is an illustration of an Anglo-Saxon cooking-pot. A list 
of others is given, to which should be added an example in the Driffield 
Museum, now in the possession of the Hull Corporation. 
In the recent Annual Lantern Slide Competition promoted by the 
Royal Photographic Society, to which selected work is contributed by 
affiliated societies, the Plaque (the highest honour) in the Scientific Section, 
was awarded to Mr. A. E. Peck ,of Scarborough. The subject was a female 
Emperor moth and eggs which were met with on a Yorkshire Naturalists’ 
Union Excursion. 
We learn from The Yorkshive Post of June 16th that ‘a tremendous 
fall of cliff has occurred at Bempton, between Flamborough and Filey, 
and as the spot is one of the principal sea-bird breeding grounds of the 
British Isles, the fall is sure to have a serious effect upon the harvest of 
eggs. At one point alone, for a distance of 67 yards, great masses of 
cliff, which in summer time are crowded with sea fowl, have dropped 
into the sea. At least 14,000 cubic yards must have disappeared at this 
spot; in fact, there is no record of a similar fall having occurred at 
Bempton or Speeton within living memory. As the fall began with the 
breeding season, it must have disastrous consequences to sea-bird life. 
Tens of thousands of the famous Bempton birds have been rudely dis- 
lodged from their habitations, and we hear from a well-known Yorkshire 
naturalist, who has visited the scene, the guillemots and puffins and 
kittiwakes have been sitting looking on at the wreckage ever since, unable 
to rouse themselves to seek suitable incubating nooks in other parts of the 
cliff... We understand that the point of cliff where the great fall has taken 
place, is that just showing out of the mist in Mr. Woodhouse’s picture, ‘ A 
Misty Morning on the Bempton Cliffs,’ forming the frontispiece to Vol. I. 
of ‘ Birds of Yorkshire.’ doe 
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Naturalist, 
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