Birds, 



0245 



inovements or shakings of the arm, so as to represent the shivering motion of the wings 

 during flight, the neighing sound was produced with the most astonishing exactness. 

 If I wished to liear the humming of hoth feathers at once, as must be tlie case in the 

 fljing bird, I found this also coukl be managed by a simple contrivance. I take a 

 small slick, and fasten to the side of the smaller end a piece of burnt steel wire in the 

 form of a fork ; then I bind to each point a side tail-feather ; then bend the wire so 

 that the feathers receive the same direction which they do in the spreading of the tail 

 as the bird descends in flight ; and then, with this apparatus, I draw the feathers 

 through the air, as before. Such a sound, but in another tone, is produced when we 

 experiment with the tail-feathers of otlier kinds of snipe. But in Scolopax major, 

 S. capensis and S. frenata are found four humming feathers on each side, which are 

 considerably shorter than in the species I have been speaking of. Scolopax javensis 

 has eight feathers on each side, which are extremely narrow and very stiff. Since in 

 both sexes these feathers have the same form, it is clear that both can produce the 

 liuniming noise ; and by means of experiment I have convinced myself that it is so. — 

 W. Meves ; Conservator of the Zoological Museum at Stockholm. 



[Mr. Wolley, who saw the experiment repeatedly performed, was perfectly satisfied 

 that this mode of explaining the neighing is the correct one. — Edward Neivman]. 



Duck breeding in a Church Toiver. — The * Sussex Express,' of July 24, gives, in 

 answer to inquiries, further information respecting the duck nesting in the church 

 tower of Bosbam (not liottingdean, as appears from the omission of the former name), 

 which is noticed in the ' Zoologist ' (Zool. 6144). Two ducks were originally observed 

 on the weathercock of the church, probably a pair, though that fact was not ascertained, 

 one only having been seen within the tower, which bird was of the breed usually termed 

 jMuscovy. Many persons witnessed her flying to and from her elevated nest, where she 

 had several visitors, and where she sat ujion twelve eggs, of which eight proved pro- 

 ductive, but unfortunately solicitude for the safety of the young ones caused them to be 

 carried down by hand, so that the problem how the old duck would have conveyed her 

 progeny to the ground was not solved. The above-named newspaper states that another 

 duck of the same kind, elsewhere in the parish of Bosham, hatched twelve young ones 

 in a pigeon-loft, bringing them all down herself, but how she accomplished it is 

 unknown. — Arthur Husaey ; Rollingdean^ August 17, 1858. 



Occurrence of the Little Gull near Barnstable. — On the 30th of last month I met 

 a gentleman on the sands near Braunton Burrows, who had just had the rare piece of 

 luck to shoot a brace of the beautiful and rare little gull {Larus minutus). I had 

 ^ these specimens in my hands ere they were cold, and noted that they were birds in an 

 intermediate state of plumage, but looking so near the adult stage that I should think 

 it probable that, had they lived, next spring would have seen them in the rare mature 

 plumage. I believe it to be a fact that the gulls (like the falcons and some other of 

 our birds) go through several moults before they arrive at that peculiar plumage 

 which marks an old bird. A gentleman has told me that he watched, this spring, a 

 large breeding-station of the herring gull (Larus canus), and was struck by the fact 

 that the brown birds (i. e. birds of the year before) kept aloof from those then actually 

 breeding, and seemed to be waiting their time until they had reached their perfect breeding 

 plumage. The two specimens of the little gull I allude to had the crown of the head 

 and back pale French blue ; on the nape of the neck was a black patch, almost forming 

 a ring round it; the wing-feathers were broadly marked with transverse bars of a rich 

 black; the tail appeared short and broad even for a gull, and the beak aud legs were 



