34 TEE ZOOLOGIST. 



egg once with four Chaffinch's eggs, and once in an empty newly-built 

 Spotted Flycatcher's nest. I took the egg, and did not visit the nest 

 again. I have a very unique Cuckoo's egg, which I found with three 

 Hedge- Sparrow's eggs ; it is perfectly blue, varying from those of the 

 foster-parents in the thickness of the shell, being a trifle thicker and a 

 shade or two darker in colour ; but the remarkable part is that the 

 egg is about the size of a pea. Larger blue eggs are met with excep- 

 tionally. — Stanley Lewis (Wells, Somerset). 



Tawny Owl in a Chimney. — On Nov. 24th, 1905, a Tawny Owl was 

 sent me, which fell dead from the same chimney as the one previously 

 recorded (1905, p. 72), and under similar circumstances. It is most 

 unfortunate that these casualties should have occurred on a property 

 where Owls are quite safe from ordinary risks, and where only a few 

 days before, when the woods were shot through for the first time this 

 season, the request was specially made that any Owls seen should not 

 be shot. This bird, like the last one, was a female, and, as the estate 

 from which it came joins the churchyard on three sides, I have little 

 doubt that it was my old friend whose nest I watched last spring in 

 the church-tower. From the letter which accompanied it, I gather 

 that the chimney is to be covered over with wire-netting at the top to 

 prevent others sharing the same fate. — Julian G. Tuck (Tostock 

 Rectory, Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk). 



Breeding of the Hen-Harrier in Cornwall. — It may be of interest to 

 note that the Hen -Harrier (Circus cyaneus) still breeds in Cornwall. I 

 know of a quiet place where two can be seen any day of the year, and, 

 until last year, of another couple a few miles distant ; but unfortu- 

 nately one of the latter has been shot. The first named successfully 

 reared three young in the year 1904, but last year, although two eggs 

 were laid in May, they had mysteriously disappeared by June. The 

 nest was a large one, built in an oak-tree about twenty-five yards from 

 the ground. This species is supposed to nest on the ground, but a 

 local man said that the large nest in question was used by the Harriers. 

 I first noticed these rare birds in November, 1903, again in 1904, and 

 several times last summer, and once last November the female only. 

 There are only a few trees — probably not more than fifty — and about 

 two acres of gorse and brake on the steep side of a short valley, four 

 miles from the north coast. Montagu's Harrier apparently breeds in 

 the Lizard district, although I have not been there, so cannot say for 

 certain. The Peregrine and Buzzard may still be seen on our cliffs, 

 but they are much persecuted in some districts, one wealthy landlord 



