5516 Birds. 



breast, scapulars and smaller coverts of the wings, orange-red ; a narrow orange trans- 

 verse band on the wings ; rump and lower parts white ; flanks reddish, with black 

 spots." — Henri/ W. Hadjield ; Tunbridge, February 2, 1857. 



Occurrence of the Hooded Croiv (Corvus comix) in Derbyshire. — Mr. J. J. Briggs 

 notices (Zool. 5363) the rare occurrence of the hooded crow in Deibyshire. It may be 

 interesting to Mr. Briggs and the readers of the 'Zoologist' in general to know that, 

 for the last five or six years, a pair of hooded crows have frequented the parish of 

 Breadsall, near Derby, during the autumn and winter months. Last winter a beautiful 

 pair were killed in the parish, and I had them preserved by Mr. Cook, bird-stuffer, of 

 Derby. They were replaced by another pair this autumn, 1856. — H. Harpur Crewe ; 

 Stoivmarket, Suffolk, January 19, 1857. 



Note on the Robin (Sylvia mbecula) and Butcher Bird (Lanius collurio). — 

 A few Sundays ago, as I was sitting in the vestry between the services, I amused 

 myself with watching a robin, which had taken refuge in the church from the 

 snow. It presently came and sat on a form close to ine, and I saw it eject 

 from its mouth a small dark pellet ; this I immediately picked up, and found 

 it to consist of the exuviae of blue-bottle flies, with two small gravel stones 

 in the centre. I was not aware that the robin was in the habit of throwing up in 

 pellets the exuviae of the insects upon which it feeds, or any of the indigestible 

 materials which it may take with its food. I have an idea that it is not generally 

 known that the common butcher bird casts up pellets ; but that such is the case I had 

 a very interesting proof some few years since. A pair of butcher birds built and 

 reared a brood of young ones in the rectory grounds at Breadsall. After the young 

 birds had flown, the male bird was shot at and winged. We put him into a cage in a 

 summer-house in the garden, and fed him with raw meat, which he ate readily. A 

 day or two afterwards we were astonished to find, lying at the bottom of the cage, a 

 number of large pellets, composed of the wing-cases and other exuviae of beetles, &c. 

 As we had never given him anything but meat or worms, we could not at all account 

 for it. We continued to find the pellets every day, and at last determined to watch, 

 and, having done so, found that the old hen bird regularly fed her mate with beetles 

 and other insects. She continued to do this for a long time, when, his wing having 

 recovered, we released him. — Id. 



Occurrence of the Firecrested Regulus (Regulus ignicapillus) near Penzance — 

 I examined a female specimen of this regulus a few days since, which was captured 

 within half a mile of this town, having the crown crest lemon-yellow, and the cheeks 

 smoke-gray. I think these characters pretty well denote a bird of the year, for I have 

 reason to think that the crest of the adult female of this species exhibits, more or less, 

 a mixture of orange-red with the yellow, which, in Regulus auricapillus, is always 

 lemon-yellow. — Edward Hearle Rodd ; Penzance, February 3, 1857. 



Note on the Common Wren. — As Yarrell writes of the wren {Troglodytes vulgaris), 

 that it often endures a frosty winter's night by uniting and roosting in company in 

 some sheltered hole of a wall or under thatch, it may be interesting to the readers of 

 the 'Zoologist' to know that, for some time past, wrens have occupied empty swallows' 

 nests, under the eaves of a house inhabited by a lady, residing in Tenterden, whose 

 love for the feathered race and appreciation of all the works of Nature have not 

 permitted these nests to be destroyed. On approaching a window near which the 

 nests are built, shortly before sunset and again early in the morning, wrens have been 

 seen to quit the nests. — S. C, Tress Beale ; Ivy Court, Tenterden, January 26, 1857. 



