252 THE BIRDS OF KORTHAMPTO^'SHIRE 



formerly in my father's employment in Lancashire 

 told us that one spring day many years ago a lad 

 came running into his house, and exclaimed, " Bring 

 th' goon, master," assuring him that he had seen a 

 strange bird on the midden close to the cottage, with 

 a cap on its head, which it had thrown off on his 

 approach, and flown into a neighbouring plantation, 

 and that he had searched diligently for the said cap, 

 but could not find it ; as they stood talking at the 

 cottage door the bird came back to the dunghill, 

 immediately " put its cap on again," and was, I am 

 sorry to say, at once shot by the keeper ; it was, of 

 course, a Hoopoe. Professor A. Newton mentions 

 nine English counties only as unstained with the 

 blood of the Hoopoe at the time of writing his 

 article in the fourth edition of Yarrell's 'British 

 Birds ' ; but we believe that one of the nine, 

 Warwickshire to wit, can no longer claim this purity. 

 Since the publication of the above article, two 

 more instances of the slaughter of Hoopoes in North- 

 amptonshire have come to my knowledge : the first 

 of these was found alive with a broken wing and 

 much damage to its tail-feathers, between Geddington 

 and Brigstock, about May 6th, 1885, and brought to 

 Mr. J. G. Field, of Kettering, who informed me of 

 the occurrence. The other of these two unfortunate 

 birds was killed at Burton Latimer on September 

 22nd, 1891, and the occurrence reported to me by 

 Mr. P. Mitchell, of Cranford. 



