5804 Reptiles. — Arachnida. 



to believe that it was a flock of swifts that was approaching, but I was 

 soon undeceived. They were now to be seen passing over-head at 

 the distance of thirty or forty yards. Their flight was circular, but 

 they were constantly deviating from this order of progression by mo- 

 mentary and sudden darts after the flies, often, when descending, 

 raising the wings so as to bring the points nearly together, after the 

 manner of the pigeon tribe. Their flight was most buoyant, and 

 occasionally bat-like, and somewhat similar to that of the hawk or 

 tern. On my shooting the one I have endeavoured to describe, the 

 rest dispersed. Although shot through the head as well as in the 

 body, I had some difficulty in killing it, its tenacity of life was so 

 great. Wilson says that "there are no bristles about the bill;" but 

 this is a mistake. The quantity of flies that these birds destroy daily 

 must be immense, for, although the one in question was shot at the 

 early hour above named, and consequently could not have been long 

 feeding, it had managed to collect some hundred flies, for, although £ 

 did not and could not count them, I found, on opening the stomach, 

 which was more distended than that of any other bird's I ever saw, 

 and measured 4 inches in circumference lengthwise and 3j in breadth, 

 that it was crammed full of flies, and I took three from its mouth and 

 gullet. Although not opened till the day after it was shot, one fly, 

 of a yellowish brown colour, with transparent wings, crawled out and 

 escaped. 



Henry W. Hadfield. 

 Kingston, Canada West, 

 Sept. 2, 1857. 



Snake diving for Water Newts. — I detected the common snake the other day 

 emerging from a pond with a newt {Triton palustris) in its mouth, which it had 

 caught hy diving. The snake seems to take to the water very much for food or cool- 

 ness during the summer months. One is hardly ever met with at a distance from a 

 stream or pond. — B. B. Smith; Marlboro' College, Wilts, September 4, 1857. 



Occurrence of Opilio hystrix at Kibworth. — Having been on the look-out this 

 year, I have found that Opilio hystrix is by no means an uncommon spider here. 

 The majority of my specimens have been taken among violets; two more, however, 

 have occurred in the house; they doubtless wandered in from a bed of violets close to 

 the window. {Vide Zool. 5627). — Alfred Merle Norman; September 8, 1857. 



