34 THE BIRDS OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



contained in a letter recently received from Colonel 

 C. I. Strong, of Thorpe Hall, near Peterborough, and 

 runs thus : — " A Grey Phalarope was shot near 

 Wansford some four years ago and shown to me, 

 I think, by Mr. Chas. Percival, of the ' Haycock.' " 

 I have only twice seen this bird alive — once on the 

 mudflats of the harbour of Santander in the early 

 part of December, 1876, and a few days afterwards 

 at sea in the Bay of Biscay, where I noticed a 

 Phalarope swimming unconcernedly almost under 

 the bows of my yacht, about five miles off Rivadesella, 

 so that I am, of course, unable to write anything of 

 its habits from personal observation, except to con- 

 firm the many pubKshed accounts of the extraordinary 

 tameness of the bird, and for full details must refer 

 my readers to the standard modern works on 

 European ornithology. I may, however, summarize 

 the matter on the authority of the fourth edition of 

 Yarrell, in which work I find that the breeding- 

 haunts of the Grey Phalarope are the circumpolar 

 regions of our globe, that its irregular visits, occasion- 

 ally in considerable numbers, to our Islands have 

 generally taken place in the autumn or winter. The 

 vast majority of British specimens are in the grey 

 plumage of winter ; an exception to this is, however, 

 quoted in the work just referred to, in the case of 

 " a beautifully marked adult bird, which was killed 

 in Wiltshire, in the month of August, and retained 

 at that time a great portion of the true red colours 

 of the breeding-season, or summer plumage." The 

 visits of this species to our Islands appear to be much 

 more frequent on the eastern coast of Scotland and 

 England and the southern coast of the latter than 

 elsewhere. Mr. J. H. Gurney, jun., is quoted, loc. 



