RARER BIRDS OF THE SOUTH HAMS. 305 
the Kestrel, Sparrowhawk, Common Buzzard, Moor 
Buzzard, White Owl, and Brown Owl. In former 
years the Kite was a common bird in this country, 
but at the present day it is particularly scarce, 
furnishing an illustration of the uncertainty of the 
geographical position of rapacious birds, and a 
proof likewise that we are inadequate to fathom 
very many of the phenomena of animal dispersion, 
for we know no reasons why that species should 
abandon us. According to Dr. Pulteney, it is very 
frequent in Dorset, and by an authority of my 
acquaintance it is not very uncommon in Oxford¬ 
shire. But this uncertainty of position is not 
confined to rapacious birds. 
When we turn to the Passeres of Oxfordshire we 
do not find more than 17 deficiencies, allowing 88 
to be the number observed in the cultivated parts 
of Devon, so that it is not in this department that 
the chief part of the difference is found. They are 
the Red-tailed Warbler, Woodchat, Mot. neglect a.* 
(Yarrel’s British Birds,) Passerine Warbler, Black 
Redstart, Sylvia neglect a, Mealy Rcdpole, Golden 
Oriole, Pied Fly-catcher, Dartford Warbler, Girl 
Bunting, Bearded Titmouse, Twite, Bee-eater, 
Siskin, Lesser Red-pole, and Reed Warbler, (the last 
two being doubtful) the whole of which are rarities in 
the British Isles. 1 have considered the Ring Ouzel 
and Water Ouzel to be almost wholly moorland 
birds in Devon, but although the latter is not met 
with so far as I know in Oxfordshire, the former 
has been sparingly observed. I have likewise noticed 
the following birds as common in that county 
. * After my Catuloguo of Birds had passed through the press, 
I learnt from Mr. Gosling that in the month of November, he 
saw a bird of this species accompanying a small flock of the 
pied sort between Plymouth and Stoke. 
N N 
