CORDEAUX: BIRD-NOTES FROM THE HUMBER DISTRICT. 
Jack Snipe arrived in coast districts. On October 6th, Mr. Haigh 
shot half a dozen Jack Snipe at North Cotes. On the 8th of 
October there was a large flight of G. ce/estis. This year the 
summer and early autumn was passed by me in Northumberland 
and in the southern counties of Scotland, and in almost daily 
wanderings in the lonely solitudes along the border I was glad 
to find such a goodly number of Golden Plover and Snipe 
breeding, the latter being particularly numerous in all suitable 
localities. I remember one day (July 18th) on the moors near 
Bonnie Rigg Hall, below the Roman station of Borcovicus 
(Housesteads), coming upon about two hundred Golden Plover 
in one flock, and of these nearly the whole must have been 
adult, for they had black breasts. There are four small lochs 
in this district, and near one a ruined shieling or farmhouse. 
This can be used to cover an approach without alarming any 
wild fowl which are on the water. Hard by the ruin was a bog 
overgrown with thickets of sweet gale, stunted alder, and willow, 
with a wealth of water-loving plants encroaching on the shallow 
end of the tarn; dense beds of bog-bean (Afenyanthes trifoliata) 
and marsh cinque-foil (Comarum palustre) with deep-cut leaflets, 
silvery beneath, and flowers of a dull purple, most attractive 
when growing in masses. Lightly stepping through a broken 
gap in the wall, I crossed to where a window, with heavy stone 
mullions, looks towards the lake. How very still and eerie the 
place seemed on this summer day. I wondered what mystery 
or what sadness dwelt there. It was so still and quiet that 
I could distinctly hear the lip-lapping of the water on the 
margin of the loch. Cautiously peeping above the massive 
stone sill of the window I saw, first, about a score of Brown- 
headed Gulls floating double, bird and shadow, as on a mirror ; 
further off was a cluster of dark lumps, which were presumably — 
a family party of Tufted Duck (Fu/igula cristata). Close to the 
ruin, on a spit of gravel which ran into the loch, was quite 
a crowd of birds. I counted seventeen Snipe, six Heron, and 
two Teal. The Snipe stood like a flock of Knot on a sand-bar. 
It was a charming picture of still life—a vision of perfect 
repose. The birds, although so near, were for a minute or more 
totally unconscious of being observed. The loch was surrounded 
by dark slopes of heather, and on the south side the view was 
curtailed by the steep and irregular outline of the great whin- 
stone sill, to the north rugged and broken with disrupted masses 
of dark basalt and crowned with the yet imposing remains of the 
‘hie Wall and Station (Borcovicus) which stands the most 
