432 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



MAMMALIA. 



Grey Seal on the Norfolk Coast. — On September 16th, at a neigh- 

 bouring fair, I came across a travelling show which professed to contain a 

 strange sea-monster captured off the Norfolk coast by one of the Lynn 

 boats. Expecting to find a Common Seal I went in, but saw, instead, a 

 Seal which was strange to me. From a description and very rough sketch, 

 which I forwarded the same day to Mr. Southwell, that gentleman suggested 

 that it might be an example of the Grey Seal, Halichcerus gryphus, and 

 this it doubtless is. It was caught in a net, about four months ago, off the 

 Norfolk coast, near Wells. The colour is dull grey, with darker markings ; 

 length about five feet ; weight (the owner tells me) about ten stone ; it has 

 a beard, or whiskers, about three inches in length. The sex I do not know ; 

 the owner believes it to be a male. It seems quite untamed, and shows its 

 dislike to being handled by uttering a sound which I can only compare to 

 the roar of a lion when hungry or enraged. Its eyes are rather large, with 

 linear pupils (the sun was shining brightly when I saw it), and their 

 expression very unlike that of the mild, dog-like, eyes of the Common 

 Seal ; in fact, if I ever saw an " evil eye " in any animal, this Seal possessed 

 it. The figure of the Grey Seal in Bell's ' British Quadrupeds ' gives a 

 fair idea of the creature ; in that work, also, the Grey Seal is described as 

 " scarcely susceptible of domestication." Mr. Southwell has kindly pointed 

 out to me that " the most reliable and striking feature in the external 

 appearance of the Grey Seal is, perhaps, the length of the nails on the 

 flippers." The owner of this example showed me where he had shortened 

 the long nails on the hind flippers to prevent them from injuring the skin. 

 The beast seemed to be in perfect health, and I should be glad to bear of 

 its being transferred to some collection where its existence would be happier 

 than in the box it now occupies. Probably the Grey Seal occurs in the 

 Wash from time to time without being identified. In my diary for 1888 

 there is a note that, one day in August of that year, when rowing off 

 Hunstanton, I " saw a very large Seal not far off," which may or may not 

 have been of this species. — Julian G. Tuck (Tostock Eectory, Bury 

 St. Edmunds). 



BIRDS. 



Migration of the Nutcracker.— The ■ Keport on the Migration of 

 Birds in Denmark for 1887,' compiled by Herr Olaf Winge (Ornis, vol. vi.), 

 contains some interesting notes on the migration of the Nutcracker, 

 Nucifraga caryocatactes, Linn., in the autumn of that year, on the east and 



