214 EARLY ANNALS OF ORNITHOLOGY 
No letter from Sir Thomas Browne is among the collection, 
but in his preface Ray acknowledges the assistance of the 
celebrated ‘‘ Professor of Physick in the City of Norwich,” 
who had communicated drawings of the Manx Shearwater, 
Little Auk, Stork, Turnstone, Scoter Duck, etc. Some of 
these drawings, which are life-sized, and really very creditable, 
are preserved in the British Museum (Bibl. Sloane, 5266). 
They are obviously the same which were made use of by 
Ray for “The Ornithology” (Tables LII., LVIII., LIX., 
LXXVIIT.), and which were also communicated to Christopher 
Merrett. They have Sir T. Browne’s name on them, as 
well as the name of the bird, in Merrett’s handwriting, in 
nearly every case. There is one drawing among them 
which represents a dead Ringed Plover, on which Merrett 
has written: ‘‘a ringlestone or stone runner which breeds 
on the shingle on by Yarmouth. §. T. B.” Neither he nor 
Ray refer to this name, here given on Browne’s authority, 
which is in allusion to the ring, or circle of stones, within 
which the Dotterel lays its eggs. It is probably quite 
obsolete now, but “ ringle ”’ is still in provincial use. Another 
drawing, which came from Sir T. Browne or his artist, is 
of a Great Crested Grebe’s leg bone, showing its peculiar 
formation and the “sharpe processe extending above the 
thigh bone,” to which Browne alludes in his catalogue. This 
sketch would almost have done duty for the Diver’s leg 
bone which Ray figured (Tabl. LXII.). A third draught 
is “‘the morinellus or sea doterell,” that is the Turnstone, 
which is mentioned in Browne’s fifth letter to Merrett, where 
he remarks “these sea-dotterells are often shot near the 
sea [in Norfolk].”’ Browne adds, what is very true, that 
his artist should have painted “a greater eye [or shade] of 
dark red in the feathers of wing and back,” but with this 
exception the painting is passable. In the same letter to 
Merrett, Browne speaks of sending a picture of his ‘‘ whin- 
bird.” This, which is rather rough, is also in the Sloane 
Collection, but it is quite good enough to prove that the 
“whin-bird ” was a Golderest, not a species which frequents 
furze. 
Other pictures of birds were communicated to Ray by 
Sir Philip Skippon, whose residence was at Blythburgh in 
