68 LETTERS TO MERRETT. 



before I should bee content to haue it agayne otherwise 

 you may please to keep it. 



Garrulus Bohemicus^"" probably you haue a prettie 

 handsome bird with the fine cinnaberin tipps of the 

 wings some wch I haue seen heere haue the tayle tipt 

 with yellowe wch is not in the discription. 



I haue also sent you urtica mas [see Note 105] 

 which I lately gathered at Golston by yarmouth where I 

 found it to growe also 25 yeares ago, of the stella 

 marina Testacea which I sent you \see Note 87] I do not 

 find the figure in any booke. 



I send you a few flies"" which some unhealthful 

 yeares about the first part of September I haue 

 obserued so numerous upon plashes in the marshes 

 & marish diches that in a small compasse it were no 

 hard matter to gather a peck of them I brought some 

 what my box would hold butt the greatest part are 

 scatterd lost or giuen away for memorie sake I writ on 

 my box muscse palustres Autumnales [See Appendix D.] 



worthy Sr I shall be euer redie to serue you who am 

 Sr your humble Seruant 



Norwich, Sep 16. 1668. 



'"^ Mr. Stevenson, whom very little relating to Norfolk Ornithology 

 escaped, was well acquainted with Sir Thomas Browne's works, yet 

 has in his " Birds of Norfolk '' unaccountably overlooked this passage, and 

 remarks that Browne does not appear to have noticed this species ; he how- 

 ever not only refers to it as above, but evidently describes it from his 

 personal observation. It is a very uncertain winter visitor to this county, 

 but on rare occasions makes its appearance in considerable flocks. A 

 remarkable instance of this occurred in the winter of 1866-7, vphen Mr. 

 Stevenson, as the result of the examination of a very large series, contri- 

 buted an exhaustive paper on the plumage of this handsome bird to the 

 "Transactions of the Norf. and Nor. Nat. Soc," iii., pp. 326-344. 



"" Mr. Verrall assures me that even in the present day it is quite 

 impossible to recognise the species of Diptera described by persons unac- 

 quainted with the particular group, and that Browne's remarks would apply 

 to hundreds of species. It is possible that an Ephydra may be meant. 

 This genus of small flies, says Mr. Verrall, abounds in such places as 

 Browne describes, but it is likely that other species were with them. 



