192 



BIRDS. 



Seebohm in his History of British Birds and their Eggs, etc. (1883), 

 has it that the AYhite-tailed Eagle was far commoner than the Golden 

 Eagle ; but I am very sure that what he has applied generally, could 

 only apply very locally, say twenty years earlier ; and I imagine he 

 was simply thinking of one reach of high cliffy coast in Skye when 

 he wrote that statement. By 1890 there were none left in Skye. 

 Seebohm speaks quite "blunderingly" when he throws discredit 

 upon the "deeply-rooted impression" that the birds "were nigh 

 extinct in Great Britain." Such a criticism from such an authority 

 only misleads those who may justly repose confidence in his general 

 knowledge, but who fail to realise (or recognise) that such efficiency 

 does not cover local knowledge. Indeed, altogether, the reflections 

 made upon the probable fate of Scottish Eagles can only be looked 

 upon as " l)lundering delusions." ^ 



Mr. John Colquhoun has repeatedly been reported as having shot 

 an Osprey (according to some), or a White-tailed Eagle (according 

 to others), at Loch Baa site, but I have positive information to the 

 contrary from his son Allan — my personal friend — who distinctly 

 assures me that his father never shot an Osprey on Loch Baa, and that 

 the only Sea-Eagle he killed was one at Cape Wrath many years 

 later (see my last volume under species). 



Astur palumbarius {L.). Goshawk. 

 Very rare. 



Mr. E. Gray quotes one early record from Macgillivray in 1835, 

 and he also tells us of one "at Glamis about five years ago," i.e. about 

 five years prior to Mr. Gray's writing (or say 1866). It had been 

 caught in a pole-trap. This is admitted as a good record ; but I have 

 elsewhere stated reasons for great care being exercised when accounts 

 of "Goshawks" reach our ears, and I need not insist again upon the 

 facts. I may however, I believe, safely admit one other — of several 



^ And I may add, in this place also, as I am criticising his work as regards Scottish 

 matters, that in similar manner his remarks about the distribution of such species as 

 Marsh-Harrier, and Hobby, and a good many other birds, in the nesting season, if 

 eyed through local-knowledge glasses, will be found wanting, and it will be seen how 

 utterly the author fails to apply his general hiowledge to local facts and circumstances. 

 I do not wish to harp upon the thread too much, but will only instance the '* Hobby 

 occasionally breeding in Orkney"— a very ancient fallacy; and the Kite was still 

 found breeding in "most of the glens" where Booth collected " some six years ago," 

 i.e. six years prior to when Seebohm wrote his History. No one has, I think, hitherto 

 considered it worth ink to correct such statements, so it is possible they might "live 

 for ever," if not blotted out. 



