Birds. 5675 



The redshank (Totanus calidris) I obtained in Bulgaria, and I saw 

 a bird in the Crimea which I thought very like it. Lieut. Irby has 

 included it in his list. The absence of anything approaching to full 

 notes on the birds of this kind is to be accounted for by the very 

 scanty opportunities we had of searching their haunts, owing to the 

 peculiar situation of the army. 



The dunlin (Tringa variabilis) I obtained, together with the ruff 

 [Machetes pugnax), from a bundle of birds which I found tied up by 

 the legs, hanging outside the hut of a friend, which were shot within 

 the few first days of April. 



Dr. W. Carte obtained the green sandpiper [Totanus ochropus) in 

 March, and it must have been the species observed by me in the 

 Inkermann Marsh late in April, when I shot a specimen of the common 

 sandpiper [Totanus hypoleucos) on the river bank. I also observed 

 what I took for another species on one or two occasions. 



The avocet (Recur virostra avocetta) was obtained near the 

 Tchernaya river, and I measured the specimen, which was, closed 

 wing 9J inches, bill 3f inches: this was the only specimen which I 

 heard of, and I believe that it came to England. 



The spring arrival of the woodcock (Scolopax rusticola) is difficult 

 to determine. I heard of one coming into a camp near the sea during 

 a snow storm one night in the middle of the first week of March. 

 Several were shot before the expiration of the week, and by the 10th 

 a good many were in. 1 heard of one being shot at the Monastery of 

 St. George on the 22nd of September, and some were found by shooting- 

 parties before October. I have heard of tolerable sport with woodcock, 

 but not as a usual thing. 



1 saw some of the common snipe [Scolopax gallinago) in September, 

 but there was very little ground at that time where one would be 

 likely to come across them. In the spring, on the 7th of March, 

 I met a man who had just fired at a snipe, and I killed one only 

 three days after : they were in the Inkermann Marsh near the end of 

 April. 



The land rail (Gallinula crex) I came across, while quail shooting 

 the last two days of September, and heard this bird in the middle of 

 May. 



Dr. W. Carte was fortunate enough to procure a specimen of the 

 little crake (Gallinula pusilla), and since I have been in England I 

 have seen specimens of it, as well as of the spotted crake (Gallinula 

 porzana), from the Crimea. Lieut. Irby has also included Baillou's 

 crake (Gallinula Baillonii). 



