MERLIN 137 
Mountain, he was attracted by the hovering of a Falcon 
near the spot, and going to the place found the shot bird 
with the feathers all plucked, but the flesh uninjured. 
The species is seldom seen away from its breeding 
haunts, and in winter does not seem to occur in Man. 
Mr. H. S. Clarke found a beautiful adult female dead on 
Cronk Sumark in the spring of 1894. 
There are several eyries in Antrim and (on inland 
mountains) in Down, and many on the lofty coasts of 
Donegal, as well as on the mountain precipices. There are 
also coast and inland nesting sites in Galloway. A few 
pairs breed in the Lake Mountains, if not yet exterminated, 
and there is (or was) an eyrie at St. Bees Head. On the 
north-west coast of England migrant specimens appear in 
autumn and winter. Though not extinct in the south and 
north-east coasts of England, the species has many more 
eyries in Wales (Mr. Oldham says there are several in 
Anglesea) and Scotland. 
In the Scottish islands it has many breeding places. 
FALCO HSALON, Tunstall. MERLIN. 
‘In the summer time,’ says Chaloner, ‘there arrive here 
out of Ireland, and the western parts of Scotland, many of 
those small Hawks, called Merlyns.’ He probably refers 
to the autumnal migration, on which this species still 
occurs in Man, though not numerously, as well as in 
spring; but two hundred and fifty years since it was 
likely more common over Britain. 
Mr. J. Kewley kept alive for some time at King 
William’s College a specimen which had been injured by 
striking on the fatal telephone wires on Langness. 
