NATURAL HISTORY NOTES. 
217 
rectly, am trying to identify the various insects found in the crops of the birds. 
I am not aware that anyone has yet named the different species {onnd to have been 
eaten by birds. Ornithological writers content themselves by mentioning insects 
in general terms, i.e., beetles, spiders, grubs, larvje and other indefinite titles, in 
speaking of the food of birds ; but I wish to be able to name them individually. 
If any entomologist would lend me his aid, or tell me where I could procure this 
information, I should be most grateful, and they would be helping to advance a 
somewhat neglected branch of ornithology. 
Soui/i Croydon. F. A. Fulcher. 
A Field Name (p. 196). — The name beginning with “q” is “ quillet,” but 
a quillet is hardly what we should call a. field, it is rather a strip of land (originally 
a furlong in length, i.e., the length of a standard furrow) marked off from 
similar strips lying in the same large field by mere-stones, or a narrow strip of 
unploughed land. It was usually employed in dividing up a tract of reclaimed or 
enclosed land among the freeholders of a manor — each freeholder getting one or 
more strips ; and it takes us back to the days when the arable land of the manor 
was tilled in common by the freeholders. Thus all the land for about 400 yards, 
lying to the east of the Great Meols station bridge, and on either side of the line, 
was reclaimed from the marsh at a comparatively recent date, probably about 
1480, and it was cut up into long strips, and some of the dividing mere-stones are 
still to be seen lying in the fields. All this land is still called quillets. 
West Kirby. M. Sybilla Dalglish. 
A Dormant Squirrel. — Two young ladies in our neighbourhood had a 
tame squirrel, which in the course of the winter — I think in February — went to 
sleep in its nest in the cage, as squirrels are very apt to do for a few hours in 
the day. However, it remained asleep (dormouse fashion) through the spring, 
and some time towards the end of May they took a peep at it. They found it 
curled up and stiff, and proceeded to bury it. I suspect it was buried alive, and 
that it was really in a condition of torpor like that of the dormouse in winter, 
which, till it is awoke by warmth, is as stiff and hard as a stone. It could not in 
any case have been dead more than two or three days, as the body was still fresh, 
so that the fact remains that it must have been asleep for two or three months. 
This I have never known of any other squirrel, and should be glad to have light 
thrown upon it. 
Taplow. L. Shore. 
Swallows. — My mother tells me of the following instance of a swallow 
returning to build its nest in the same spot, which must have occurred some 
seventy years ago. At the house where she lived in Herefordshire as a child, the 
swallows used to build under the eaves outside the nursery window. On one 
occasion a long hair had become fastened in one of the mud pellets of which the 
nest was formed. Looking out one morning, the head nurse found a swallow 
hanging by the hair which had become twisted round the bird’s leg, which was 
broken. Cutting down the sufferer, the nurse repaired the mischief as well as 
she could by amputating the limb some way up. She then let the bird go, which, 
in due course, went to pass the winter in some warm climate. The following 
spring, on the return of the swallows, the same bird, minus half a leg, was found 
to build her nest in the same place. 
Clifton, Bristol. Giles A. Daubexy. 
A Friendly Drake (p. 195). — That the drake is a bird of intelligence and 
also of an affectionate disposition I can well believe. Some years ago, when dig- 
ging in my garden, I was greatly amused at the behaviour of a drake belonging 
to a neighbour. The poor bird had been gobbling up all the worms which I had 
turned up, and was in the midst of its feast, when a thought seemed to strike it, 
and turning away it waddled off a considerable distance, and returned with its 
mate, to whom it appeared to offer a share in the rich repast. 
Fyfield, Abingdon. W. II. Warner. 
Communities of Pig;s (p. 196). — Mr. Powell will find this subject alluded 
to in Gilpin’s Forest Sienery. The author, however, does not speak of 
Sicilian, but of New Forest swine. 
Fyfield, Abingdon. 
W. H. Warner. 
