206 Letters, Extracts from Correspondence, Notices, fyc. 
article on the birds of the Philippines, obtained during the same 
expedition by Dr. Henderson,—which we look forward to with 
much interest; as, though some fine collections have been made 
in those islands, and many new species described, we are desti¬ 
tute of any general account of their ornithology. 
A new part of the quarto * Journal’ of the same Society (vol. iv. 
part i.) commences with illustrations of three very fine birds 
which have recently been described by Mr. Cassin : pi. 1 , Sele- 
nidera spectabilis, a new Toucan, from Veragua; pi. 2, Numida 
plumifera, and pi. 3, Phasidus niger, both from Western Africa. 
The last bird is peculiarly interesting, as being a new form of the 
Phasianidce, a group feebly represented in the Ethiopian Region 
by the genera Numida and Agelastes. 
XXII.— Letters, Extracts from Correspondence, Notices, fyc. 
We have received the following letters from Mr. Gould and 
Mr. J. H. Gurney :— 
To the Editor of the Ibis. 
Sir, —As you will probably be desirous of recording in * The 
Ibis ’ the capture of any of our rarer British birds, I send a few 
lines to inform you that a splendid female Goshawk ( Astur 
palumbarius) was shot by one of the keepers of Sir S. Morton 
Peto, Bart., at Somerleyton, near Lowestoft in Suffolk, on the 
24th of January in the present year. As I was shooting at 
Somerleyton at the time, the bird was placed in my hands soon 
after it was killed, and there can be no doubt, therefore, of its 
being a truly British specimen. The bird in question was a fine 
female, and weighed as nearly as possible 2 lbs. 14 oz. Had it 
lived another month or two at the utmost, it would have assumed 
its adult livery, a change having already commenced on the 
throat and upper part of the neck, the feathers on those parts 
being barred, while those on the breast had the usual elongated 
markings of immaturity. The bird had been noticed for nearly 
a month prior to its being shot, and on one occasion visited the 
neighbourhood of the keeper’s house, causing the utmost alarm 
and consternation among his tame fowls. Its object in this in- 
