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APPENDIX. 
annually for the last six or seven years, since the present proprietor 
came into possession of the place. The following paragraph appeared in 
the e Northern Whig 5 newspaper of May 21, 1850 
“ On the morning of the 18th inst., Francis Shaw, a man employed 
by Colonel Stewart to trap rabbits in his demesne of Killymoon, saw 
an old woodcock, with a brood of young ones, in one of the woods. 
He caught two and brought them to the mansipn, where they remained 
for some time, until Colonel Stewart ordered them to be taken back to 
the place where they were caught. They could not fly, but were, 
nevertheless, of a good size, the head and bill of each being nearly as 
large as those of old birds. Shaw stated that he had seen seven or 
eight of these young birds. — Another man employed about the demesne 
saw five young ones the same day. Several old woodcocks were seen in 
the woods about Killymoon during the week. Young woodcocks were 
found there once before within the last twenty years,’ 5 
The same newspaper of Tuesday the 9th of July, 1850, contained 
this paragraph : — 
“ On Saturday last, as a man was mowing grass, in a very quiet spot 
not far from Cookstown, he flushed a woodcock. On examining the 
spot whence the bird rose, he discovered its nest, with four eggs in it. 
The bird did not return to the nest, which was formed of dry leaves, 
green moss, and a little withered grass.” 
Both these localities are in the county of Tyrone. 
In some parts of Ireland, woodcocks were unusually plentiful at the 
end of December 1849, and in January 1850. At the former period a 
number were killed at Knappan (county Antrim), during severe frost 
and snow ; the stomachs of five of these birds came under my examina- 
tion ; four of them were filled with fibrous vegetable matter, and a 
number of minute coleopterous insects ; the fifth was filled with the re- 
mains of Coleoptera, with the exception of two or three white larvae : — 
they were the fattest birds I ever saw. The chief dealer in game, at 
Belfast, received thirteen couple from a person living near Glenarm, in 
the same neighbourhood in the first week of January, and on the 9th of 
the month, fifteen couple, all of which had been shot. On the 1 7th, 18th, 
and 19th of January (frost and snow), he received sixty couple, many 
of them killed in the vicinity of Belfast ; he had never before known 
them to be so plentiful. In the covers at Stuart Hall (county Tyrone), 
eleven brace were shot one day early in the" month during frost and 
