196 STARLINGS BREEDING—VAST FLOCK OF. [PART II. 
its nest. The first instance in which I ever heard 
of their doing so was between thirty and forty years 
ago, when the coachman of the late Sir John Bar- 
rington, having brought with him from Essex a nest 
of young Starlings as a curiosity, was told that a 
nest had just been discovered near Newchurch. 
They have ever since remained to breed in the 
Island in gradually increasing numbers, but it is 
only within the last fifteen or twenty years that 
they have done so nearly to such an extent as 
at present. 
I saw on the 18th of November, 1852, in the 
Island, a flock of Starlings far exceeding in num- 
bers any that had ever before come under my own 
observation, or that of any of the party who were 
with me. It would be impossible to form an esti- 
mate of their numbers, but they blackened a very 
large extent (several acres I should think) of the 
field on which they had alighted. One of our 
party fired at them at an enormous distance, and 
knocked down about sixteen, a number which he 
would probably have more than doubled, but that 
he, not seeing the main body, fired his first barrel 
at a small detachment. It seemed to be their 
first and only appearance, for I could never hear 
that this vast flock was ever seen again. 
