NATURAL HISTORY NOTES 
191 
to approach, its vanishing supper. My own large blue Persian cat was also an 
interested, but respectful, spectator of the scene. 
Augtisi 2 , 1904 . Lydia Pkngei.ly. 
153. Another Cat Story. — The following e.\tract from the letter of a 
friend of mine residing at Hastings, New Zealand, may interest your readers: 
“Let me tell you about a cat I had to “take in” with some fowls I bought. 
It appears that the cat was brought up with the fowls and lived with them 
entirely, never coming into the house. When I brought the fowls and the cat 
(a tabby) home I put him and the hens in their house, and when later I went to 
look at them, there was the cat between two hens up on the roost asleep. He 
sleeps there every night. During the day he wanders about with the fowls 
and always feeds with them. 
Folkestone. Charles F. W. T. Williams. 
164. A Mousing: Hen. — The other day I noticed one of our hens snatch 
up something from the grass in the field, worry it, drop it, and proceed to dance 
upon it. Going to examine her find, I discovered she had caught a good-sized 
mouse, but immediately upon my approach she swallowed it whole, tail and all, 
gulping it down in great haste, and with much difficulty. As this is a unique 
event in my experience, I should be glad to know if any other Selbornians have 
hens who are mousers. 
Llanbedr, Tat-y-Cafn, Angela Brazil. 
N. IVales. 
155. Migration of Birds. -In Harper's Magazine for February, 1885 , 
in an article on “ Guardian Birds,” by John A. Coryell, it is mentioned on 
the authority of Dr. Van Lennep, that the crane is in the habit of carrying small 
birds across the Mediterranean on its back, “ such as the ortolans, darnagas, 
tree figs, wrens, titmice, smaller thrushes, finches and others, which are obliged 
to leave Europe for a warmer climate as soon as cold weather sets in. They are 
incapable of a long-sustained flight, and in the attempt to cross the Mediterranean 
would surely perish in its waters. . . . Most of the cranes are migrating 
too, and usually are to be seen making their way south at the first approach of 
autumn coolness. Ihey fly low, uttering an odd cry, as of alarm. At once the 
would-be little travellers below mount upward, and incredible as it may seem, take 
up their quarters on the backs of their long-legged, big-hearted friends. There 
they comfortably sit, and repay their benefactors by their cheery twitterings and 
merry songs. In the return voyage the cranes do not trouble themselves to fly 
low, but, as if knowing that going down is easy work even for a small bird, they 
fly high, and let their little passengers drop off at their own convenience.” The 
article is accompanied by an illustration of three cranes with their “ passengers,” 
and the writer adds, “ It may be that future investigation will prove that the con- 
duct of the crane is the result of some less noble impulse than that of doing good 
for good’s sake ; but in the absence of necessary proof to that effect, it will do 
no harm to accept it as it appears to be.” 
Perhaps not ; but it would be interesting to know how much truth, if any, 
there is in the matter, and what other observers have to say on the subject. The 
remark as to the “cheery twitterings and merry songs” at any rate would appear 
to be largely drawn from imagination, as no human observer would be likely to be 
present to hear and record them. \V. 
156. Green Sandpiper. — This bird is a regular visitant here, and at this 
time of the year two or three pairs are to be seen daily on a fallen tree in the 
decoy a few hundred yards below my residence. They left us, probably to breed 
in more northern climes, about the middle of May. In the afternoon of July 15 
I heard the cry of a pair high in the air. They had just completed the journey 
from abroad, and on arriving over the decoy made a sudden dash downwards, 
wheeled round to see that all was right, and then went on to a swampy spot 
between the hills, where they often feed. The green sandpiper has been under 
observation here for the last five years, and always goes away about the same time 
in May. 
Southacre, Szuaffham, 
July, 1904. 
Edmund Thos. Daubeny. 
