XIC.HTINtlALE. 105 



hen bird made her nest in an evergreen oak just below Mr. 

 Dryden's bedroom window, laid four eggs, hatched the young 

 birds and got them all awa}'. Mr. Dry den would not allow 

 anyone to interfere with the nest, fearing it would cause the 

 old birds to 'forsake;' as he thought, if permitted to breed and 

 get away, they might return another year, which, however, they 

 did not. The cock bird sang most vigorously until the hatching, 

 after then we heard him no more. Hundreds of people came 

 to hear the bird, and on a fine evening I have heard it quite 

 half-a-mile away from Normanby. The 'concert' began at 

 evening twilight, and continued all night. Great disappoint- 

 ment was caused to numbers of people who came to hear the 

 bird after he ceased singing, i.e., after the young family required 

 his attention.' 



The supposed instance of a Nightingale at Tollesby, in 

 Cleveland (Naturalist, Sept., 1890, p. 271) is doubtful. A closer 

 investigation of the subject shews that, although Mr. Emerson 

 frequently heard the bird sing after dark in a high thorn hedge, 

 and had little doubt in his own mind as to its identity, he never 

 obtained a view of it. We cannot, therefore, accept it as a true 

 record. — T.H.N. 



In the extreme southern-eastern position of the central 

 plain, at the foot of the Wolds at Market Weighton, in June 

 1880, the Rev. C. S. Atkinson (Field, June 5th, 1880, p. 735) 

 wrote that one had been singing every night in the wood at 

 Harswell Rectory for a week or ten days ; which he believes to 

 be a most unusual occurrence so far north, though not without 

 precedent in this neighbourhood. This last remark is correct, 

 for the writer is indebted to the Hon. Francis H. Dawnay for 

 the information that one was heard at Everingham Park, the 

 seat of Lord Herries, a few years before 1880; w^hile at Brough, 

 Mr. L. H. West recorded in the Zoologi-t (1880, p. 406) the 

 nesting of a pair, in 1880, which brought up their young safely 

 and left in iVugust. — W.E.C. 



