4016 Birds. 



togelher, springing hastily to the height of 40 or 50 feet, and then turning suddenly 

 and somewhat clumsily, after a tew more rapid strokes, sailed along with the arched 

 form of wings so general in game birds. Mr. Yarrell's next notice is derived from a 

 letter in the possession of John Biitton, Esq., giving an account of two bustards seen 

 on Salisbury Plain in the summer of 1801, within a fortnight of each other, both of 

 which attacked mounted horsemen, and one of which was captured and kept for some 

 time by Mr. J. Bartley, of Tilstead, by whom it was eventually sold to Lord Temple. 

 The letter gives numerous details of the habits of this bird from the information of 

 Mr. Bartley. J. H. Gurney, Esq., of Norwich, states in a letter to Mr. Yarrell, that, 

 as far as he can learn, the last bustard killed in Norfolk was a female, which was shot 

 at Lexham, near Swaff ham, towards the end of the year 1838. The small flock of 

 which this was one, had for several years consisted of females only, the eggs of which 

 were frequently picked up, having been dropped about at random in consequence of 

 the absence of male birds, the latter having become extinct at an earlier date. Fredk. 

 J. Nash, Esq., of Bishop's Stortford, has several times informed Mr. Yarrell, that 

 when taking the field as a young sportsman, he once saw nine flights of bustards in 

 one day, not far from Thetford, in Norfolk. And Gilbert White, of Selborne, men- 

 tions in his Diary, under date of November 17, 1782, that being at a lone farm-house 

 between Whorwell and Winchester, the carter told him that about twelve years before, 

 he had seen a flock of eighteen bustards at one time on that farm. Three instances 

 only of the appearance of the bustard in England have been noticed by Mr. Yarrell 

 since the publication of the second edition of his ' History of British Birds;' one, a 

 female, recorded by G. R. Waterhouse, Esq., of the British Museum, as occurring to 

 him in August, 1849, on Salisbury Plain ; a second, also a female, shot at Lydd, in 

 Romney Marsh, in January, 1850, and now in the possession of Dr. Plomley, F.L.S.; 

 and the third, shot on the 31st of December, 1851, in Devonshire, and now in the pos- 

 session of J. G. Newton, Esq., of Millaton Bridestow. Mr. Yarrell proceeds to state 

 that he had long wished to have an opportunity of examining the body of a male bus- 

 tard, for the purpose of inspecting the gular pouch described by Daines Barrington in 

 his 'Miscellanies,' 1781, and by Edwards in his 'Gleanings of Natural History,' 1811, 

 and thence copied both by Bewick and himself; but no opportunity for so doing 

 occurred until recently. About four years ago the Zoological Society obtained from 

 Germany six or seven young bustards, and one of these (a male) died within a year. 

 The body was examined by Mr. Mitchell and himself, and no gular pouch was found, 

 but this was then attributed to the youth of the bird. In December last another male 

 of this flock, believed to be four years old, died at the Zoological Gardens, and was 

 also examined by Mr. Yarrell. The neck was carefully dissected ; but there was no 

 opening under the tongue, and he entirely failed in various attempts to distend any 

 part of the membranes either by fluid or by air. Thus disappointed in his expectation 

 of finding what had been so minutely described, Mr. Yarrell turned to the translation 

 of the anatomical descriptions of the animals dissected by the Royal Academy of Sci- 

 ences at Paris at the end of the seventeenth century, and found the results of the dis- 

 section of six male bustards there given to correspond entirely with his own observations. 

 He found also thatCuvier, in his ' Lec^ons d'Anatomie Comparee,' refers to no peculi- 

 arity in the neck of the male bustard. Professor Owen also entirely confirmed the 

 fact of the absence of any gular pouch by his own dissection of a full-grown bustard, 

 made with the view of obtaining a preparation of that supposed structure for the Mu- 

 seum of the College of Surgeons. Mr. Yarrell is therefore disposed to consider that 



