444 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



NOTES ON OXFORDSHIRE ORNITHOLOGY. 



By the late Charles E. Stubbs, of Henley-on-Thames. 



Edited by 0. V. Aplin, F.L.S. 



Charles E. Stubbs, of Henley-on-Thames, who died in 

 1872, at the age of (about) seventy-seven, formed an extensive 

 collection of the eggs of British Birds. His carefully prepared 

 " Egg Book " is now in the possession of Mr. Heatley Noble, to 

 whom I am indebted for the loan of it, and permission to publish 

 some extracts from it relating to the birds of Oxfordshire. This 

 very interesting volume is not merely a catalogue of Mr. Stubbs's 

 eggs, but is rather a sketch of the history of the different species 

 of birds, the eggs of which were represented in this (at that date) 

 very complete collection. Under the heading of each species 

 especial reference is made to the status of the bird in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Henley. From internal evidence the "Egg Book" 

 proper appears to have been completed in the year 1867 ; but at 

 the end of the volume Mr. Stubbs wrote "A slight Sketch of the 

 Ornithology of Henley-on-Thames," and this seems to have been 

 written just subsequently to the winter of 1867-8. In the 

 extracts from the MS., which I here reproduce, I have brought 

 together under the heading of the respective species the informa- 

 tion contained in the " Sketch," and in the Catalogue so far as 

 it relates to Oxfordshire birds. 



This information is especially interesting from the facts that 

 it shows the status during the earlier part of the nineteenth 

 century of some birds which have decreased or increased since 

 that period, and that it relates to a part of the county scarcely 

 touched upon (and that merely in reference to a few rare visitors) 

 by the Messrs. Andrew and Henry Matthews in their "Account 

 of the Birds of Oxfordshire and its Neighbourhood," published 

 in ' The Zoologist ' for 1849 and 1850. Mr. Stubbs was evidently 

 an excellent field ornithologist of the old-fashioned sort. He 

 was a frequent contributor to the pages of ' The Zoologist ' in 



