470 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



Ornithological Notes from the Isle of Man. — During the last two 

 years I have again had various opportunities of observing the Chough 

 (Pyrrhocorax graculus) on the Manx coast. On April 1 5th, 1895, Mr. F. 

 S. Graves and I visited an old haunt of the bird. This is a large cave, 

 accessible from the beach at low water only, but piercing so far inland that 

 its head is never reached by the sea. Finding the tide too far turned to 

 admit of our getting in by land, we obtained, with some difficulty, a boat 

 from a neighbouring strand, and rowed to the place. While trying to 

 reach it by shore we had heard the Choughs' cries, but we had been some 

 time in the cave before they appeared about the entrance, flying and calling, 

 which they did intermittently while we remained there. Toward the mouth 

 of the cavern, about thirty feet up, in an inaccessible crevice under its 

 vaulting, we could see the nest, a conspicuous mass of sticks. On May 

 10th I found another nesting place in a part of the island where I should 

 not have suspected the present existence of the Chough — in a stretch of 

 low but much broken rocky coast, where the cliffs were probably never more 

 than fifty feet high. A few Herring Gulls were nesting on flattish places 

 among these rocks, and heathery and ferny ground, varied by some little 

 "orchards" or patches of trees, came down to their edges. Near at hand 

 was a burn-foot with a shingly beach, and the place commanded a wide view 

 of the headlands and sea and the opposite mainland mountains. The 

 nesting place was a rough gully, with sides so close together, and in 

 places so overhanging, as almost to form a cave ; the water never leaves its 

 mouth, and its interior is blocked by great boulders wedged between slippery 

 tide-washed ledges ; altogether as inaccessible a spot as could be found in 

 so low a coast. The nest was evidently among the crevices in the dry 

 upper part of the gully, which was here very narrow, but so dark and 

 ragged-edged that, though I several times visited the place, and frequently 

 saw one or both birds come out of the chasm, I could never make out its 

 exact situation, either from the top of the cliff or the bottom of the gully. 

 The hen bird, after being roused from the nest, sat on a wooden fencing on 

 the brow above, uttering, with opened wings and shaking body, its wild 

 explosive cry of " kee-aw." This year I again saw the birds in the same 

 locality, but am not able to say if they nested. On the cliffs in this 

 neighbourhood, between Laxey and Dhoom, the " Caaig," as it was called, 

 is said by elderly men to have been quite common within their recollection. 

 It is now protected by Manx law all the year round, and, though probably 

 nowhere numerous, I should consider it by no means yet on the verge of 

 extinction. One of the immemorial sites of the Peregrine Falcon (Falco 

 peregrinus) on our east coast was occupied both in 1895 and 1896. This 

 year one of the young birds was caught on the rocks before it was well able 

 to fly. On the cliff where this nesting place is situate are the remains of 

 three large nests, probably Ravens', but none of these have been lately 

 occupied. There is a small colony of Martins (Chelidon urbica) in a 



