‘70 RAMBLES OF A NATURALIST. 
mandible is without a sheath, and its breast is spotted with 
grease. The tongue appears to be still in the mouth. Ina 
cursory glance through, I noticed an adult Haliaetus pelagicus ; 
and a Red-breasted Goose, not the specimen recorded by 
Vieillot as killed near Strasburgh, of which Kroener makes 
no mention (“Appergu des oiseaux de l’Alsace et des 
Vosges ”) ; also a separate collection of Alsace birds, contain- 
ing many rarities of local interest, eg., four adult (grey- 
visaged) Honey Buzzards, and an example of the white 
variety, which is rarer than the white or whitish Common 
Buzzard, a Hawk Owl, killed in 1842 in the forest of 
Brumath, anda Tengmalm’s Owl. Of this last the editor of 
the fourth edition of “Yarrell” says, “occasionally occurs 
on the Vosges.” He might have gone further, since, accord- 
ing to M. Kreener (I. c., p. 5), it is sedentary (though very 
rare) nesting “dans les hauts vallons de la vallée de 
Munster.” 
I brought away two relics from the house of the taxider- 
mist. Perhaps some will remember an account of the havoc 
which the bursting shells played among his insects and 
stuffed birds. One was a piece of a Middle spotted Wood- 
pecker, which had originally been stuffed, but having had 
the misfortune to be hit again, was instantly torn in pieces. 
‘The other was a Water Ouzel, which had had a similar hard 
fate of being shot twice over. 
A venerable pile is the ancient Minster of Strasburg, and 
very sorry I was to see that on one side its long buttressed 
nave had suffered a good deal. Though not a mark itself 
for the Prussian artillerymen, except when used as a look- 
out, it would appear that some of the houses in its immediate 
vicinity were selected to suffer. Of one called the Maison 
Ohlmann, which is but divided from the Cathedral by the 
breadth of the street, only the bare walls remained. The 
shoemaker who tenanted it may well have envied his neigh- 
bours, for the houses on either side of it were untouched. 
