NOTES AND QUERIES. 315 



building of a Sparrow's nest in a box, it is pretty certain to be that of 

 the Tree- Sparrow, and clutches of six eggs are far more frequent with 

 this species than with its larger relative. A pair of Spotted Fly- 

 catchers built a very pretty nest on the lid of a box, but so far as I 

 know no eggs were laid, and we had a Pied Wagtail's nest in an old 

 water-can in ivy on a wall, which hatched off all right. One of my 

 correspondents in Lancashire begged for a clutch of Nuthatch to put 

 under a Tit, and of seven eggs I sent him five were hatched out by a 

 Blue Tit. He tells me the young birds went off all in good time, and 

 it will be interesting to know if they breed in that locality next year. 

 I have not seen a Kedstart or a Redstart's nest this season ; they have 

 occasionally come to the boxes, and a boy working in the garden told 

 me in all good faith that he had seen a Nightingale go into a box, 

 which, it is almost needless to add, was a hen Redstart. One of our 

 prettiest summer migrants, the House-Martin, is certainly on the 

 increase here, and I always endeavour to keep alive the old super- 

 stition that if the Martins' nests are disturbed it will " bring bad 

 luck to the house." — Julian G. Tuck (Tostock Rectory, Bury St. 

 Edmunds). 



AMPHIBIA. 

 The Natterjack Toad (Bufo calamita) in Bedfordshire. — Jenyns, in 

 1835 (' Manual of British Vertebrate Animals '), spoke of this Toad as 

 met with in plenty on Garnlingay Heath, in Cambridgeshire, which 

 was about a mile from the border of Bedfordshire, and which similar 

 tract of country extended as far as Sandy, some five miles distant. A 

 few years later almost the whole of this heath-tract of country was 

 broken up and brought under a high state of cultivation, which it was 

 thought involved the extermination of this amphibian. Prof. Alfred 

 Newton, however, kindly informs me that it is still known and survives 

 at Gamlingay, though restricted to a very few spots, in its old haunts. 

 On June 16th last, late in the evening, I met with a single specimen 

 near some water-holes of a sand-pit, in the parish of Sandy, and on 

 the following day found this species fairly abundant in what was 

 evidently their spawning haunts. Examination of the excrement of 

 several taken at the time consisted partly of the wing-cases of smaller 

 Coleoptera, including the ladybird-beetle, but in confinement worms, 

 caterpillars and other larvse, woodlice, earwigs, and insects generally 

 seem to be readily taken. — J. Steele-Elliott (Dowles Manor, Shrop- 

 shire). 



Variety of the Common Toad. — A curious variety of the Common 

 Toad (Bufo vulgaris) was found in the garden here on July 11th. It 



