NOTES AND QUERIES. 107 



Northumberland and Durham') says, "this spring and autumn migrant is 

 not by any means so abundant as the two previous species" (the Blackcap 

 and Garden Warblers), but goes on to say that he had himself taken two or 

 three of its nests near Newcastle, the only one particularised being at 

 Scotswood Dene in 1832. I have personally noticed the Lesser White- 

 throat, about the end of May, in the valley of the Darwent near Burnopfield, 

 Co. Durham ; but the only instance in which I have met with it in 

 Northumberland was in 1881, when, as recorded in the ' History of the 

 Berwickshire Naturalists' Club ' (vol. x. p. 389), I shot two young birds, on 

 the autumn migration, in our garden here, about the middle of September. 

 One of these, 1 am pleased to say, is still preserved in my collection, but 

 the other having fatten, when shot, into the way of a tame fox, which we 

 then had in the garden, was devoured by him, only sufficient being saved 

 to enable me to identify the bird. Berwick, though on the other side of the 

 Tweed, is yet in England, and for parliamentary and other purposes forms 

 part of Northumberland, so that we may therefore claim the record. Although 

 Mr. Muirhead is probably right in discarding the Lesser Whitethroat from 

 the ' Birds of Berwickshire,' with the remark that "no specimen has yet 

 (March, 1888) been obtained" in that county, my friend Dr. Charles Stuart 

 is persistent in declaring that he has, on at least one occasion, thoroughly 

 identified it near Chirnside, during the breeding season, and I know lives in 

 the hope of being able some day to satisfy sceptics by indisputable evidence 

 of its occurrence there. — George Bolam (Berwiek-on-Tweed). 



Lesser Whitethroat in Co. Durham. — Mr. Chapman is perfectly 

 right — this bird is extremely scarce in the county, and I have often 

 wondered why. I was as keen a birdsnester when a boy as anybody, and 

 knew the neighbourhood of the city of Durham, where I was at school for 

 eight years and a half, as well as most people. During the above time 

 I only saw two nests of the Lesser Whitethroat, both, curiously enough, in 

 the same plantation near Bear Park, the only locality where we ever heard 

 or saw the bird near Durham. The place is now a congeries of pits, 

 pit-heaps, and cottages, and one might now look with as great probability of 

 success for a Great Auk. 1 have only thrice seen the nest in Northumber- 

 land. This bird is so plentiful in the Midlands — here in Northamptonshire, 

 for instance — and also extends its range so much further north — it is not 

 uncommon in Norway, and I found it on the Dovre fjeld almost up to 

 4000 feet — that its curious scarcity in N.E. England must be due, one 

 would think, to some minute economical reasons which do not come within 

 our ken. As to the Lesser Whitethroat's beiug "not authenticated in 

 Northumberland," that assertion is a little too sweeping. See Hancock's 

 * Catalogue,' pp. 71, 72, and my own recorded experiences in ' The Zoologist,' 

 1884, p. 93. If further proof be needed, I can show some eggs from the 

 Tyne Valley. — H. H. Slater (Irchester Vicarage). 



