292 THE BIRDS OF DEVOX. 



a female, shot in a turnip-field on January 1st, 1880, at Handley, which 

 "vvas sent to Mr. Hart, of Christchurch, for preservation. But subsequently 

 (Zool. 18S8, p. 420 ) lie was able to record another which in the summer of 

 1888 frequented the high land above Fontmell, near Shaftesbury, and went 

 off unharmed. On the authority of Hex. J. H. Austen, Mr. More (' Ibis,' 

 1865, p. 429) added Dorset to the list of counties in which he had ascer- 

 tained that the Great Bustard formerly nested. 



Mr. Cecil Smith knew of no Somerset Great Bustard, but at the time 

 there were Bustards on the Wiltshire Downs some of them must 

 occasionally have visited the !^^endip country, only a short flight to the 

 west. On Sept. 22nd, 1870, Mr. J. E. Hatting had the good luck to see 

 alive Great Bustard on Shapwick peat-moor, as he was travelling on the 

 Somerset and Dorset Railway between Highbridge and Wells. The bird 

 was close to the line, and Mr. Harting had a clear view of it (' Field,' Jan. 

 14, 1871). 



At the breeding-season adult male Great Bustards develop a singular 

 gular pouch, which tliey inflate with air, and so distend the throat to 

 an extraordinary size ; this they do when showing themselves off to their 

 admiring harem, with drooping wings, with their tail expanded and turned 

 over their back in the manner of a Turkey Cock, and Avith all their feathers 

 ruffled out. 



The Great Bustard usualh' frequents plains, large corn-fields, turnij)- 

 fields, and downs, and, in this country, generally nested in fields of lye 

 and wheat. The last date for an English nest was 1833, and the place 

 (ireat Massingham Heath, in Xorfolk. There are many memorials of the 

 former existence of the Great Bustard as an indigenous bird, in Bustard 

 Inns, Bustard Pools, &c. In the village of Martin, on the S.W. corner of 

 Salisbury Plain, a ])ond still goes by the name of the Bustard Pool, and 

 the tradition remains that the Bustards used to come to it to drink. Adult 

 males are magnificent birds and attain a great weight. One we received 

 from Seville scaled 28 lbs. in the meat. 



Montagu says : " In the winter of 1798 one was killed near Plymouth in Devonsliire, 

 and two others the following year in the same county " (Orn. Diet.) ; and " one of this 

 species shot in Pevonsliire in the year 1<S(J4, and taken to Plymouth Market, was 

 bought by a pubHcan lor a shilling " (Orn. Diet., Siippl. 1813). One at Houndale, 

 Dartmoor, 17U'.), Rev. S. Eowe (E. ]\I., in Rowe's Peranib. Dartmoor, App. p. 233). 

 This was probably one of those alluded to by Montagu. A specimen purchased 

 at the sale of the Eev. Kerr Yaughan's collection by the late Mr. John Elliot 

 of Tresillian, Kingsbridge, is said to have been bought in Plymouth Market early 

 in the present century (E. A. S. E.). A Bustard was shot in the parish of Bratton 

 Clovelly, on 31st Dec. 1851 (J. G., 'Naturalist,' 1852, p. 33). Two, both females, 

 were shot and a third wounded out of a flock of seven or eight at Croyde and 

 Braunton on Dec. Slst, 1870 ; some were seen soon after at Ilolsworthy (Zool. 1871, 

 pp. 2474, 2475, 2510). Three Bustards, probably the survivors from this flock, were 

 seen on Salisbury Plain at the end of January 1871, and two were shot (Zool. 1871, 

 pp. 2477, 2510;.' 



