3088 Notices of New Books. 



wall alluded to, in a few minutes the old cuckoo flew over the wall to 

 the nest ; I immediately applied a pocket telescope to my eye and 

 very distinctly saw the old bird feed its young. This operation I 

 watched some time every day, creeping nearer and nearer till I could 

 see distinctly the actual feeding of the young without the aid of tele- 

 scope or spectacles. I now became anxious to know whence the bird 

 procured its food, which I imagined from its frequent visits to the 

 nest, was at no great distance, and of what description it was. Know- 

 ing the cuckoo to be particularly fond of caterpillars, I walked into 

 the garden, where there were some gooseberry-bushes covered with 

 caterpillars of Abraxas grossulariata ; thither I bent my steps, and saw 

 the cuckoo engaged in clearing the bushes of the caterpillars. When 

 she had what she considered sufficient for that meal, off she flew in a 

 direct line over the wall, and as if she had been shot, dropped on the 

 other side, where the hedge in question was." — Page 11. 



3. Dipper singing after it was shot. 



" At the close of winter, or rather early in spring, whilst following 

 the windings of a small stream in East Lothian, with my gun on 

 my arm, I started a dipper, and sent a random shot after it. The 

 bird appeared to be hit, but it flew on and at length settled on a stone 

 about a hundred yards distant from me. Favoured by an intervening 

 bank, I approached within a short distance of the spot ; and never 

 shall I forget the sweet warblings of that little throat as it murmured 

 above the sound of the purling brook. My anxiety to procure a 

 specimen caused me again to put up the bird, and I killed it on the 

 wing ; but when I came to examine the stone where it had been sitting, 

 and found thereon several drops of blood, I was stung with remorse 

 to think I had been the means of taking its life. Poor little dipper ! 

 it had actually been singing after receiving a death wound." — Page 13. 



4. Great Black Woodpecker building in a brick wall. 



" It is generally supposed by ornithologists that this beautiful 

 bird is a straggler in Britain. This, however, is not the case, for I 

 have known it to breed and rear its young in several instances at 

 Claremount, in Surrey. On one occasion I was anxious to see the 

 contents of the nest, which had been built in a hole in a brick 

 wall. The brick had been destroyed from the effects of frost, and 

 mouldered away. The bird had so completely replaced one of its 

 own making of clay, with the exception of a small round hole for its 

 use, it might have been passed by without being seen. My hand 

 being much larger than the hole, and the clay having become so hard, 



