INTRODUCED SPECIES XC1 



ginia Quail (Ortyx virginianus) has been shot in Cumberland in 

 a couple of instances, near Carlisle and near Allonby. I have 

 examined both specimens, and they appeared to be in adult 

 plumage. It is not known who turned them down. Possibly 

 the late Mr. Jackson Gillbanks may have attempted to introduce 

 them. The late Sir F. Graham, Bart., obtained Scotch eggs of 

 the Capercaillie (Tetrao urogallus) in more than one season. 

 Several young birds were reared, but they never established 

 their race in the Netherby coverts. One fine male lived for 

 some time in the neighbourhood of Longtown, where he was 

 well known to the public from his fearlessness. The late Jerry 

 Smith told Mr. Senhouse and myself that he had heard old men 

 say, when he was a boy, that the Capercaillie had once upon a 

 time inhabited the pine forests which clad the naked mountains 

 of Lakeland before so many trees were cut down for shipbuilding 

 and for charcoal-burning. It is by no means unlikely that bones 

 of this species may yet be discovered among the animal remains 

 which lie hidden in the fissures of the limestone rocks of West- 

 morland. The Purple Gallinule (Porjphyrio cceruleus) appears to 

 have been shot at Grange in September 1876, and the proba- 

 bility is that this bird had been artificially introduced. The 

 specimen was shot by a man named Allen, who afterwards died 

 in America. Mr. E. T. Baldwin investigated the history of the 

 bird a few months after it had been killed. To his thoughtful 

 kindness I owe the opportunity of quoting the accounts of it 

 furnished by the younger Kirkby, who mounted the bird, and 

 by Allen, who killed it. James Kirkby states in his letter of 

 August 2, 1877, that 'there was not any appearance of [its 

 having been] an escaped bird, it seemed to be in full plumage 

 (of a very dark purple), the bulk of the bird would be about the 

 size (sic) of a large coot, the beak and forehead being of a bright 

 crimson, the legs very long.' Writing from Castlehead Lodge, 

 near Grange, on the 8th of August 1877, the keeper, Allen, in- 

 formed Mr. Baldwin that he believed his bird ' to be called the 

 Sultana bird or Hyacinthi Gallinule, a native of South Africa.' 

 He saw it frequently for a month before he shot it. The first 

 time that he noticed the Gallinule, ' it was in Company with a 

 very large Covey of Partridges in the stubbles. When at a dis- 



