NATURAL HISTORY NOTES. ri; 
ward and across a broad sea for any other purpose would be a most singular pro- 
ceeding, quite out of keeping with the ordinary rules of bird life. 
Mr. Grant Allen is very emphatic concerning the connection lietween this bird 
and the mistletoe. “ The truth is,” he tells us, “ the mistletoe and the missel- 
thrush are developed for one another,” the bird propagating the plant and the 
plant feeding the bird. As a matter of fact, there is no stronger bond between 
them than a somewhat dubious matter of nomenclature. Missel-thrushes abound 
where no mistletoe grows, and were the latter dependent on the services of the 
former there would, we fear, be a dearth of it in our Christmas markets. More 
than this : if the fact be so, why does the missel-thrush go off each summer to 
“ its Norwegian estate ”? The mistletoe is surely not found in pine woods or on 
moors. 
J. G. 
NATURAL HISTORY NOTES AND QUERIES. 
More about Rooks. — The Southampton rooks mentioned on page 98 are 
good, but our brand-new Folkestone rookery is better, and may almost be called 
a “ record.” Six or seven nests, with nestlings and all complete, have been set 
up on two or three trees of very meagre size, and in a very confined space between 
the backs of two rows of houses in one of the busiest parts of the town. Why 
the birds established themselves there it is difficult to see. There are much finer 
trees within a short distance, and old-established rookeries not far off. But rooks 
are so intelligent that possibly they have come there to escape the yearly massacre 
of their young. No gun can molest them where they are, and authority, in the 
person of the Town Clerk, protects them from its back windows. 
A. L. Hussey. 
Birds in Richmond Park. — On Sunday, April 19, I spent two hours in 
the morning in Richmond Park. Entering by the Ham Gate I strolled about a 
quarter of a mile into the park and laid down and basked and jotted down the 
birds which came under my notice. During those two hours my list amounted to 
no less than thirty species — none of them rare, but many interesting. I .saw eight 
herons at the same time flying overhead, so that though there may be good 
foundation for the abuse which has been lavished upon the persons who are 
responsible for the felling of trees containing the herons’ nests, there is no 
ground for the supposition that all the birds deserted the park at once and for 
good. The following is my list as it was taken down : — Starling, sparrow, rook, 
robin, blue tit, wood pigeon, thrush, hedge-sparrow, nuthatch, wren, chaffinch, 
blackbird, sw.allow, crow, partridge, chiff-chaff, tree pipit, willow wren, cuckoo, 
jackdaw, great tit, pheasant, heron, missel thrush, redstart, pied wagtail, linnet, 
green woodpecker, stock dove and cole tit. There is no reason to suppose the 
list would be any smaller on any bright spring morning. 
A. Holte Macpherson. 
Curious Nests Built by Magpies. —I can corroborate the story of the 
nest built by magpies of wire (see page 73) by an incident which occurred about 
four years ago in the grounds of a devoted friend of animals, who has, within a 
few weeks, gone to her rest — my friend Mrs. Walker, of Robin Hood, whom to 
know was to admire as a clever woman, and to love as one full of goodness. 
She had a pair of tame magpies who roamed at liberty and came at call. When 
the nesting season came they built a nest (I think they built two) of pieces of 
lead wire, short lengths which had been brought from Mr. Walker’s works in 
town to tie on tree labels. The magpies had every kind of material suitable 
for their purpose of which their nests might have been constructed, but they 
deliberately selected and stole the lead wire only because it was something new 
and worth stealing, for they did not use the nests for any legitimate purpose. 
Birmingham . L.awson Tait, 
A 
