266 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



anything they all set up a lively chirruping. I have never heard the 

 Long-eared make the No. 3 sound Mr. Gyngell describes in the May 

 ' Zoologist,' but one day I visited a Tawny 's nest, with newly-fledged 

 young, in a spruce-fir, and the old bird, when disturbed from the nest, 

 flew from tree to tree close by, and every now and then brought its 

 wings together beneath it with a loud "bock." I followed her about 

 until satisfied as to how she did it. On another occasion (a bright 

 sunny day) I came across a Tawny sitting in a small spruce-fir eating 

 a Starling. When disturbed it behaved as I have never before or 

 since seen one. It flew from top to top of the large spruce-firs, every 

 now and then bringing its wings together with a "bock," and then 

 uttering a loud prolonged laughing cry, like that of a Peregrine when 

 one is near its nest. A Barn-Owl I kept used to snap its beak, and I 

 have heard wild birds utter their ghastly shriek, a loud "kee-yak," 

 like that of the Tawny, and the peculiar snoring noise of the young (and 

 old ?) in the nest, and when sitting about in the trees after having left 

 it. With our very defective night vision it is seldom one has a chance 

 of fixing the author of any strange sound one hears. I long attributed 

 the abrupt "chuck" of the Nightjar to the Long-eared Owl, until one 

 night a Nightjar sat a few feet off me on a light dusty road making 

 this noise. I therefore hope many of your correspondents will give 

 us instruction on our lovely and interesting night-birds by recording 

 the opportunities they have had of discriminating between their nume- 

 rous and varied notes. — C. H. Bryant (76, Grand Parade, Brighton). 



Montagu's Harrier at Rainworth in June. — A keeper near here, 

 having lost several young Pheasants, put it down to a Sparrow-Hawk, 

 and on June 14th, in the dusk of the evening, seeing a Hawk, shot it ; 

 he brought it to me on the 15th, when I saw it was a male Montagu's 

 Harrier (Circus cineraceus). I was indeed sorry, because one would 

 suppose it was one of a pair, and most likely breeding in the forest, a 

 large extent of which is heather and white grass, and is just such a 

 place we should expect to find this species nesting, though so far I 

 have never known it to do so. This is only the third specimen of this 

 Hawk I have known to have occurred in Notts, and, curiously enough, 

 all have been obtained near where this one was shot. — J. Whitaker 

 (Rainworth Lodge, Notts). 



Nesting of the Merlin in Breconshire. — Two nests of Falco cesalon 

 have been found this spring by a gamekeeper on the Nant-ddhu Grouse 

 moor, about twelve miles south-west from Brecon, and about twelve 

 hundred feet above sea -level. One was found on May 15th, and 

 another on May 25th. The first contained three fresh eggs, and the 



