Birds. 761 



exposed, it (the moorhen) usually takes wing, skimming along the 

 surface of the water, but only for a short distance, to the first bush 

 or cover that offers, where it conceals itself so effectually, either by 

 submerging its body, and keeping only the bill above water, or in 

 some hole or shelving retreat in the bank, &c." — lb. 189. See also 

 Mont. Orn. Diet, Art. Dabchick; andYarr. iii. 284, where the hooded 

 merganser, when wounded and almost exhausted with incessant 

 diving, is said to " immerse its body, raise the point of its bill above 

 the surface, and in this manner make its way among the plants, until 

 finding, &c." By the way, if we take this account literally, the 

 bird's nostrils are in the point of the bill, and the weeds must be 

 very obliging not to make the poor bird undergo a species of semi- 

 strangulation every now and then, in addition to forcing its head 

 backwards, in what would be to " a human" (as the Suffolk people 

 say) a most uncomfortable position. J. C. Atkinson. 



Note on the capture of the Great Grey Shrike. A birdcatcher whom I occasionally 

 employ has just brought me a specimen of the greater butcher-bird, which he caught 

 in the act of pouncing on one of his lure birds : it was taken alive, and I regret he 

 killed it, as T should like to have studied its habits ; it agrees most exactly with 

 Bewick's wood-cut and description. — J. B. Spencer; Blackheath, October 12, 1844. 



Anecdote of the Starling* An instance of this bird's cleverness occurred here this 

 summer, which may be thought worth preserving. A starling had a nest, and reared 

 young ones under the eaves of the roof within the basin of a drain-pipe which re- 

 ceives and carries off the water from the gutters. Here I used to see the mother 

 coming to feed her young ones, which she did frequently. They were very voracious, 

 and as they got stronger, they pushed forward so eagerly to obtain the first supply of 

 food, that they fell out of the basin one after another. Three I know fell out, one of 

 which was killed. The others were taken up unhurt, and I had them placed in a 

 basket, covered over with netting, which was hung up near the nest, in expectation 

 that the mother bird would not fail to supply them. This was done overnight, and 

 next morning I found to my surprise that one had disappeared ; so I watched to see 

 what would become of the remaining one. It made a great crying to arrest its pa- 

 rents' attention, and the parent was not unmindful of it: I saw her fly near the basket 

 with food in her bill. She settled on the roof and gutter within sight of the basket, 

 but went away without trying to feed the prisoner. This was done several times, and 

 at last I discovered her object — what I must believe to have been her object — for the 

 young bird's hunger becoming more and more pressing, it continued struggling to 

 reach the food, and did contrive to " get out" through the netting, when it fell to the 

 ground without injury. Though unable to fly, it was strong upon its feet, and it ran 

 upon the lawn. The parent now came down to it with food as before, but not yet to 

 feed it. She flew on a little away from it, and so enticed it into the corner of a 

 shrubbery under a wall, where I discovered the missing young one also, and where she 



ii 2 1 



