342 Proceedings of the Boyal Physical Society. 
been done either in the way of discovering or discrimi- 
nating new species. Of the three last added, the chiff- 
chafF (8ylvia hippolais) was shot at Ulbster, in July, 
by Mr E. I. Shearer, who subsequently procured another 
specimen. A fine male blackcap warbler {Curruca atri- 
capilla) was shot by myself on the 16th October, and a 
female of the same species on the 28 th (the birds were ex- 
hibited). Besides the fact of these birds being new to the 
Far North, the dates are so late that it has been matter of 
surprise to all who have heard of the circumstance, and 
know something of the economy of the bird, how such a 
delicate member of the family of Sylviadce could possibly 
subsist at such a season in this climate. With the excep- 
tion, however, that the male was not in song, both birds 
were as active and lively as they are described to be in mid- 
summer, and both, too, were in perfect plumage. I have 
observed, in cases where the swallow has prolonged its stay 
with us until far on in the season, that there was an evident 
lack of that liveliness, vigour, and power of flight, displayed, 
for instance, in the month of June ; but no such peculiarity 
was observable in the blackcaps. This, for the most part, 
perhaps, may be owing to the fact that the blackcap, when 
insect food is scarce, can subsist on the smaller fruits, while 
the swallow is wholly insectivorous. While under my own 
observation, the blackcaps fed principally on the berries of 
the mountain-ash. The Naturalist-Editor of " The Field" 
newspaper, in commenting upon the occurrence of the 
blackcap in Caithness, truly remarks : — " In the statement 
that the blackcap eats rowans, in Caithness, in the middle of 
Octoher, we have therefore three novel facts in natural 
history, instead of one/' The third and last addition was the 
cole tit {Parus ater), shot in a narrow belt of plantation 
about a mile from Yv^ick. Mr Sandison, who shot this 
specimen, also procured another, some days after, from the 
country. This beautiful bird, although common in most 
Scottish counties, has not hitherto been recorded as occurring 
in Caithness. In addition to these, a crossbill, which some 
authorities have pronounced to be Loxia ^pityopsittacus (the 
bird was exhibited) was found dead in the neighbourhood of 
