3654 Birds. 



large heathy tracts where there were patches of fern, furze, and dwarf 

 shrubs. I never observed the slightest appearance of a nest, nor have 

 I ever found more than two eggs together. The eggs are marked and 

 blotched with grayish and greenish ash-colour; they differ in the shades 

 being lighter or darker. The female, when sitting upon her eggs or 

 young, squats so close and flat, besides remaining motionless, and her 

 colours harmonizing with the surrounding surface of the ground, that 

 she is not readily seen, except one happens to catch sight of her large, 

 lustrous, dark eye ; indeed, when she has young, she will almost let 

 you tread on her before she attempts to rise. 



I have found the fern-owl common in Kent, Sussex, and Hamp- 

 shire ; and once found a single egg of the bird, in the month of June, 

 in an open part of Epping Forest. 



W. H. Thomas. 



15, Hanover Street, Walworth, 

 September 27, 1 852. 



Supplemental Note on the Black-bellied Darter, (Plotus Anhinga). 

 By the Rev. Alfred Charles Smith, M.A. 



I make no apology for writing a few additional remarks on the black- 

 bellied darter, as the principal part of my present communication will 

 be composed of an extract from a letter 1 have lately received from 

 Mr. Waterton, and which that gentleman has kindly allowed me to 

 make use of in my account of the bird killed near Poole (Zool. 3601), 

 but which did not reach me until after I had sent that account to the 

 ' Zoologist ' 



Speaking of the Plotus Anhinga, Mr. Waterton thus writes : — 

 " By mere chance, I may say, I have acquired some knowledge of 

 the habits appertaining to the bird after which you inquire. I never 

 found it on the sea-shore of Guiana ; but when I was far away in the 

 interior, searching after genuine Wourali poison, it was plentiful on 

 the wooded banks of the river Essequibo. You have described the 

 darter very accurately in your letter to me : but probably there is some 

 difference in the plumage of that which frequents the United States, 

 and of that which is found in Guiana. Should the darter of the United 

 Stales inhabit the sea-coast, I see no reason at all why it should not 

 occasionally take flight to Europe, as it would have a sufficient sup- 

 ply of its natural food all the way over. But 1 cannot, by any means, 



