MR. F. LENEY ON ADDITIONS TO NORWICH CASTLE MUSEUM. 433 
Lennard, a female Pheasant ( Phasianus colcldcus) assuming 
the plumage of a male, shot at Horsford, January 2nd, 1911. 
The immature female Iceland Gull (Larus leucopterus), shot 
at Caister, near Yarmouth, November, 1874, described in 
Stevenson’s “Birds of Norfolk” (Vol. III., p. 336), was obtained 
by purchase at an auction sale in Yarmouth. 
The importance of the study of Natural Science has been 
brought before the notice of the most casual observer by the 
exhibition of preparations illustrative of the life histories of 
injurious insects. For example, the life history of the Wasp 
illustrates the Queen Wasp, the small nest she constructs, 
the egg, pupa, and larva of the Wasp, the undeveloped 
female or “ worker,” the “ drone ” or male, a section of large 
nest showing pillars supporting the layers of comb, worker 
cells and queen cells, and a specimen of the Hornet for 
comparison of size and colour. The injury by Wasps to ripe 
or ripening fruit is also illustrated, and various means by 
which their nests may be destroyed are clearly described. 
The number of visitors to the Castle Museum as recorded 
by the turnstiles was 130,284, against 134,573 in the previous 
year. 
XII. 
THE RETURN OF THE BITTERN. 
By Miss E. L Turner. 
Read joth April , igi 2 . 
“A bittern booms from the distant fen 
And the sound of the night’s in the air.” 
There are some sounds which only seem to emphasise the 
great silence which broods over the mystic marsh-lands at 
night, and amongst them the “ reel ” of the Grasshopper 
Warbler and the “ boom ” of the Bittern are pre-eminently 
suggestive of solitude and a silence that can be felt. The 
