94 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



in the beginning of August. A good setter I had used to point 

 them, and I have watched them running in the herbage like rats, 

 occasionally coming out from their shelter, with the utmost 

 tameness, to squat in some tump of grass at my feet. I had no 

 doubt these birds had been hatched close at hand." 



Devonshire. — Of this county the Kev. Murray A. Mathew 

 writes : — " We used frequently to flush Spotted Crakes in clover- 

 fields when Partridge-shooting in September, and, at the time we 

 rented the shooting on the Braunton Burrows, were wont to come 

 across them when Snipe-shooting in the winter, during the months 

 of December, January, and February. I have in my collection 

 a very beautiful adult male Little Crake, which I saw my 

 brother shoot on Braunton Burrows on February 4th, 1876. 

 Like the Spotted Crake, this smaller bird is probably also a 

 resident, in limited numbers, but, from the extreme difficulty in 

 flushing it, it escapes detection. On the Braunton Burrows I 

 have on several occasions seen small Crakes run into rat- 

 holes for shelter, and at the time could not determine whether 

 they were maruetta or parva." The bird shot as above 

 stated, on February 4th, 1876, is included by Mr. Pidsley 

 in his work on the 'Birds of Devonshire' (p. 121), as Baillon's 

 Crake (P. bailloni) and was so recorded in ' The Zoologist ' (1876, 

 p. 4844) ; but Mr. Mathew informs me, by letter, that it is " a 

 very perfect adult male Little Crake " (P.parva). 



Mr. W. S. M. D'Urban (Moorlands, Exmouth) has forwarded 

 to the Editor a note (handed to me for incorporation) as follows : 

 — " I saw a specimen of this bird, recently mounted, in a bird- 

 stuffer's shop-window, killed at the end of October, 1890, in the 

 marshes behind the railway-station at Exmouth. Mr. B. P. 

 Nicholls, of Kingsbridge, writes me word that he had two 

 specimens sent to him last autumn from Wadebridge, Cornwall, 

 in which county he thinks it is more numerous than in Devon. 

 At Kingsbridge, according to Messrs. E. A. S. Elliot and K. P. 

 Nicholls, this species is ' rather rare, but several have been shot 

 in the district.' The late Kev. B. A. Julian says, in ' The 

 Naturalist ' (vol. i. p. 87), ' Very rare. Is occasionally seen in 

 the months of September and October in Efford Marsh, where 

 one specimen was obtained. The Bev. C. Bulteel also has a 

 specimen in his collection, which he shot near Ermington.' It 

 has occurred several times at Plymouth. One shot Nov. 10th, 



