lxxxviii PROLEGOMENA 



above the sands. They have been figured by my friend, Mr. 

 F. S. Mitchell, in the Birds of Lancashire (see p. 151). Neither 

 Mr. Mitchell nor I have seen them at work. The fact is that 

 they are only used occasionally, and then only in the winter 

 months. But they have been described to me by the Flook- 

 burgh fowlers, and no fault can be found with Mr. Mitchell's 

 account. The same remark applies to the Flight-nets used upon 

 the north coast of Lancashire for taking Oyster-catchers, 

 Dunlins, and other seafaring birds. Flight-nets have never 

 taken a proper footing on the Cumbrian coast. They were used 

 for a few years at Haverigg, near Millom, whence a few Terns, 

 which had meshed themselves in the nets, were sent to me. 

 The last time that I inquired about them, I was told that their 

 owner was dead. On Walney Island such nets were used by 

 Troughton, who caught great numbers of Oyster-catchers. This 

 species, together with Knots, Peewits, and Dunlin, constitutes a 

 large proportion of the birds netted by the Flookburgh fowlers. 

 I have seen these nets at work likewise on the shores of the 

 Scottish Solway, but the idea of using them was introduced 

 from Lancashire, I believe; at all events, it had a foreign 

 origin. 



Last, but not least in interest, allusion must here be made to 

 the obsolete custom of capturing Guillemots and Eazorbills in 

 nets, while the birds perched in rows upon the ledges and 

 pinnacles of the Sandwith precipices : * And Ther is fowles ther 

 builds in the St. Bees Eock : it is called : these fowles as bigg 

 and swift of wing as duck and mallard : And builds in the Rock 

 they hangs over the see : and They Let downe a broad nett from 

 the Topp of the Rock And frights The fowles of ther nests, and 

 the netts cacth them : They cannot flye when they are half a 

 mile from the sea.' x There does not appear to be any 

 documentary evidence that Guillemots have been netted at their 

 breeding stations on any other part of the British coasts. The 

 only notice of the kind that I have as yet been able to dis- 

 cover appeared in an unsigned article, entitled * A Fortnight in 

 Faroe,' contributed to No. lxxx. of the North British Review. The 

 writer was evidently an ornithologist, and his essay contains 

 1 Sandford MS., p. 18. 



