390 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



MAMMALIA. 



White-beaked Dolphin at Great Yarmouth. — A White-beaked 

 Dolphin {Delphinus albirostris), 54 in. in length, was brought in on 

 July 12th ; it was taken in the nets of a herring-lugger the night 

 previous. With the great increase of steam drifters cetaceans appear 

 to have become comparatively scarce. — A. Patterson (Ibis House, 

 Great Yarmouth). 



AVES. 



Notes from Yarmouth. — Bird-life in this locality during the past 

 dreary summer and autumn has not presented many interesting 

 episodes. My month's holiday on Breydon mud-flats in July and 

 August afforded as blank a record as any I ever remember. 



A late Oystercatcher (Hcematopus ostralegus) flew past me on Breydon 

 on the night of June 20th ; and up to June 25th I never saw fewer 

 Redshanks {Totanus calidris), which nevertheless had a good time in 

 the upper marsh-lands, for they were reported numerous on the 

 Beccles river, and in August were around my location on the flats in 

 exceedingly gratifying numbers. I suspected them of feeding on 

 Oorophium longicorne, a species abounding in the surface of the ooze, 

 and on small red mudworms beneath it. Lesser Terns were familiar 

 objects in May and June, the smart little fellows fishing all around 

 one, as if man had never an evil thought, and they were attracted still 

 closer by an imitation of their note. Two pairs would, I believe, have 

 nested with us on a flat they took a fancy to ; they roosted on some- 

 what dry spots. There at night, right through May, they fished in its 

 vicinity, and when it was too rough, angled in the semi-brackish 

 ditches for Three-spined Sticklebacks, and even seemed to prefer 

 fishing there when the Herring- Syle appeared in the tidal water. I 

 had more than one happy moment watching them dropping upon 

 their prey as I skulked in the grass at a ditch-end. They seldom 

 missed a " stoop." But their household anticipations were suddenly 

 overthrown by the incoming of rather full spring tides, which washed 

 them and their prospects off the flat together. Nevertheless, some 

 were seen about until June 27th. As early as July 7th several came 



