NOTES AND QUERIES. 391 



back again from a spot best not localised. On Aug. 21st the old birds 

 capturing juvenile Herrings for their young was a most interesting 

 observation, while the eager and fussy solicitations of the young Terns 

 were charming. They followed their parents awing, preferring to drop 

 on to the surface of the water to receive their dole. Two or three 

 score used Breydon up to the end of August, when, alas ! some guns 

 arrived to break up these happy family parties. If men would only 

 learn how much more delightful and bewitching it is to look down the 

 inside of a field-glass than to squint down a gun-barrel, what greater 

 happiness would obtain to all parties concerned ! A Caspian Tern 

 {Sterna caspia) turned up on July 24th, and a young Black-headed 

 Gull (Larus ridibundus) on July 2nd. Two Cuckoos were piping early 

 on the morning of July 3rd. One gave the cry in the natural key ; the 

 other more shrilly, and half a tone higher ; and, curiously enough, 

 unaided by an echo, piped " cuck-cuck-oo!" I never heard this cry 

 before ; have any of your readers ? I had ample opportunity for hearing 

 many a repetition of it. 



The Heron is a bit of a wag in his way. One, having satisfied 

 the cravings of hunger, amused himself catching such little Eels and 

 Flounders as came near his submerged feet, letting them go again — 

 probably with a caution ! Imitating the cry of a passing youngster, 

 in the dusk on Aug. 4th, I decoyed him to within a very short distance 

 of my head. Greenshanks were fairly numerous "on call" during 

 August. Knots, Turnstones, Curlew- Sandpipers, in some numbers 

 too — the Knots so tame that a couple I passed and repassed would not 

 flit from a bit of floating wood they were resting on until forced to fly 

 by water repeatedly splashed on to them by my oar ; they seemed to 

 wonder, as I did, what business of mine it was to interfere. Only one 

 Spoonbill was observed on Breydon this year, which, being innocent 

 enough to wander to the marshes, was shot. — A. Patterson (Ibis 

 House, Great Yarmouth). 



Wood-Sandpiper in the Orkney Islands. — I think perhaps it may 

 be of interest to record the occurrence of the Wood-Sandpiper (Totanus 

 glareola) in the Orkney Islands. A friend of mine shot one in my 

 presence on the island of Eday on Sept. 1st. It rose out of a Snipe- 

 bog, and at the moment of firing he took it for a Snipe ; but, on 

 examining it, we soon identified it as a Wood- Sandpiper. Both Wood 

 and Harting say that the bird is rare in Scotland, so perhaps this 

 note may be worth printing. The bird was tame, but it had an 

 even more erratic flight than the Snipe. — C. S. Buxton (Newtimber 

 Place, Hassocks). 



