THE GREAT NORTHERN DIVER. 
281 
Tliere are probably few ornitbologists (I do not mean col- 
lectors) who, having read some notes on this species by Mr 
Harvie Brown, in the volume of the “ Zoologist ” for 1868, 
pp. 1309, 1424), entertain any doubt as to its having bred in 
Sutherlandshire, and one cannot help hoping that ere long that 
indefatigable out-of-door naturalist will, by the discovery of 
the eggs themselves, silence once for all certain less fortunate 
individuals who think fit to pooh-pooh any discovery in which 
they themselves are not directly concerned. 
I have been told by Charles Thomson, now an old man, but 
from his youth up the constant companion of wild fowl shooters 
as well as the preserver of their spoils, and possessing a very 
accurate knowledge of the birds of his native island (Unst), 
that he had but once met with the young of the Northern 
Diver, and that was many years ago, when an adult bird, 
accompanied by two young ones apparently not more than 
three weeks old, was seen by him at Balta Sound, rather late 
in summer. 
In the volume of the Zoologist ” for 1843 (page 365) is the 
following note from the pen of Thomas Edmondston, dated from 
Balta Sound, September 1843; - — Note on the Northern Bimr . — 
A few weeks ago, my uncle, Mr Edmondston of Buness, shot a 
young bird of this species ( Colymhus Immer of the older writers), 
which wns evidently a bird of the year, the quills being almost 
unformed, and, in short, being scarcely fledged. This proves 
that the Northern Diver breeds in Shetland, a fact I have long 
suspected. The specimen alluded to was killed from a com- 
pany of five individuals, two of which were old birds and three 
[twm ?] similar to the one procured.” 
