NOTES AND QUERIES. 78 



own word of similar meaning, viz. mouette (or mot), which is connected with 

 tnew — a word still found in the Scotch name for a gull, namely, maw. In 

 short. Guillemot is a Celtic-Teutonic compound, in which one word explains 

 the other. Finally, Nuthatch does not mean, though it may imply. Nut- 

 cracker, but is simply another form of Nut-hacker, i.e. Nut-hewer. The 

 bird may hack at a nut, which may or may not be cuacked by the blow. — 

 A. H. Meiklejohn (Highworth, Ashford, Kent). 



MOLLUSC A. 

 Molluscs eaten by Wood-Pigeons. — Referring to the notes on this 

 subject (Zool. 1900, p. 484), not only is this usual iu wild birds, but also in 

 fancy Pigeons occupying our aviaries ; my brother kept a number of the 

 last, which he was in the habit of letting out in early mornings for exercise. 

 After such excursions they fed their young as soon as they returned, and I 

 have frequently cleaned away from round their beaks (i. e. of the squabs) 

 remains of Snails and Slugs : these young were always stronger than the 

 young of those who never had their liberty, and consequently had no oppor- 

 tunity of obtaining such food : though, when I have supplied a handful of 

 the large garden shelled Snails, they have been eagerly eaten, smashing the 

 shells as do Thrushes. My outdoor experience teaches me that Wood- 

 Pigeons and others not only partake of, but search for (as eagerly as 

 Thrushes, &c.), such molluscs as are to be found in our fields and inland 

 waters, to which my experience has been confined. — Wesley T. Page 

 (6, Rylett Crescent, Shepherd's Bush, W.). 



ORGANIC EVOLUTION. 



Non-Protective Colouration in the Variable Hare. — When reading 

 Mr. Marshall's paper on "Conscious Protective Resemblance" (Zool. 1900, 

 p. 536), some remarks of his recalled to my mind a very striking example of 

 how an instinct, born of a protective colouration, may defeat its own purpose 

 under a change of environment. On p. 54*2 Mr. Marshall quotes Romanes' 

 remarks about the melanic variety of the Rabbit crouching as steadily as 

 the normally coloured type, and rendering itself " the most conspicuous 

 object in the landscape." In March, 1899, Mr. C. Oldham and I observed 

 a number of Variable Hares (Lepus timidus, Linn.) on the moors in Long- 

 dendale, Cheshire. The weather was mild, and we only saw a single patch 

 of snow, but the Hares were still in their white winter pelage, though 

 most of them had already patches of brown about the head and flanks. 

 These animals are the descendants of some Perthshire Hares which were 

 turned down near Greenfield, Yorkshire, about twenty years ago, and which 

 have increased in numbers, and have spread over a large tract of moorland 

 in Yorkshire, Cheshire, and Derbyshire, In the North of Scotland the 

 Zool. -tth ser. vol. V., February, 1901. a 



