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small numbers, in the months of April and May, and again in August and September with the 

 young of the year. In Feltwall fen, where they were formerly very plentiful, and their eggs 

 (known as ' Starn's ' eggs to the fenmen) were used as nest-eggs for the Lapwings to ' lay to,' 

 Mr. Alfred Newton informs me they had long ceased to breed until the spring of 1853, when, 

 attracted by the wide extent of waters still unsubsided after the great flood of the previous 

 winter, three pairs of Black Terns, with some Redshanks and Black-headed Gulls (species which 

 had also ceased to nest in that locality), remained to breed, but did not attempt to do so the 

 following season, when the face of the fen country had reassumed its more modern aspect. In 

 the Broad-district the last nest of this species I have any knowledge of was found, at Sutton, in 

 1858. A single pair made their nest on the Broad about the middle of May, and, I am sorry to 

 say, were shot by a marshman, and with two eggs, freshly laid, were sent to a birdstuffer in 

 Norwich. Both birds and eggs are now in my possession, the former having been shown to me 

 in the flesh, the latter before they were blown. The loss of this species as a summer resident in 

 our marshes, like that of the Black-tailed Godwit and the Avocet, is due mainly to those physical 

 changes which drainage and cultivation have effected in their former haunts, no amount of 

 egging or other persecution during the breeding-season causing them to forsake ancestral spots 

 till these were fairly ' broken up,' as, Mr. Lubbock states in a communication to Yarrell, was the 

 case with a great breeding-place of the Black Tern at Upton near Acle in this county, where 

 ' hundreds upon hundreds of nests might be found at the end of May.' Some fifty years ago 

 they bred also, at that time, about Horsey and Winterton, near Yarmouth. I have known this 

 species occur as early as the 2nd of April ; and both in spring and autumn stragglers are not 

 unfrequently met with on our inland meres and lakes, and following the course of the Yarr 

 from the coast at Yarmouth. I have known a specimen shot near the foundry bridge, within the 

 bounds of the city ; and others have been seen on the reservoir of the Norwich waterworks, on 

 the further side of the city." Mr. Cordeaux says that it is not uncommon on the shores of the 

 Humber district in the autumn : immature birds are piincipally met with ; but occasionally 

 mature birds are obtained. 



It appears to be a somewhat rare straggler in Scotland. Mr. Don, about the end of the last 

 century, recorded it as common on the sands of Barrie ; but it appears doubtful if the birds seen 

 by him were resident. Mr. Bobert Gray writes (B. of W. of Scotl. p. 472) that " of late years 

 Black Terns have been observed in the spring time and autumn in many Scottish counties; but 

 these, generally speaking, have been stray birds. In Haddington, Berwick, Aberdeen, Fife, and 

 Dumfriesshire many specimens have from time to time been shot and preserved. In the west of 

 Scotland small flocks occasionally appear at Loch Fyne and other sea-reaches. Mr. George 

 Hamilton informs me that he and his brother observed five specimens near Minard in September 

 1860 ; and I have myself seen the species on Loch Lomond, flapping round the boat in which I 

 was rowing, within a distance of eight or nine yards. I may add that one (an adult bird) was 

 shot near Stranraer on the 29th August, 1868, and preserved by Mr. M'Cornish, birdstuffer in 

 that town ; and about the same time in the year following, a young bird of the year was seen by 

 myself at Girvan, in Ayrshire. Mr. Angus informs me that a specimen of the Black Tern was 

 shot near Aberdeen by Mr. Giles, a well-known artist residing in that city, and that another (in 

 summer plumage) was shot by himself at Don Mouth on 30th April, 1867. The specimen on 



