THE FAUNA OF THE NEW RIVER. 
69 
those of whom We know anything Were later than the obvious 
date of these portraits and none of them was a medical man, 
so far as is known. Thus there was one Robert Dale (perhaps 
a great-grandson of Samuel Dale), who, after living at Booking 
(where, doubtless, he was born), left it as a young man (probably 
very early in the Nineteenth Century) and removed to London. 
There he carried on business as a dealer in trimmings for beaver 
hats, residing successively at a number of addresses in and 
around Finsbury and Moorfields. He was father of that well- 
known dissenting preacher, the Rev. R. W. Dale (1829-1895), 
of Birmingham, who was born in London after his father’s 
removal thither. 114 
NOTES ON THE FAUNA OF THE NEW RIVER 
AND RESERVOIRS IN THE LEE VALLEY. 
BADGERS, OTTERS, HERONS, WILD FOWL, AND 
CARRION CROWS, Etc., WITHIN SIGHT OF 
ST. PAUL’S CATHEDRAL. 
By J MACKWORTH WOOD, M.Inst C.E. 
[Re.id 5th July, rgig,) 
S many of the large Waterworks of the Metropolitan Water 
Jr\ Board are situated in the Lee Valley in the County of 
Essex, it will probably interest the Members of the Essex Field 
Club to know that some of the Mammals and Birds inhabiting 
the County are resident on these Works and can be seen at any 
time by casual observers when passing through the Reservoir 
enclosures within six or seven miles of St. Paul’s Cathedral. 
During the great flood in January, 1918, a very fine male 
Badger got into the Chingford aqueduct and was taken out 
drowned at the weed grate at Chingford Mill. He must have 
fought hard for his life, as all the toe nails of his front feet were 
worn entirely down in his attempt to climb the stone walls 
forming the sides of the aqueduct—it is probable he came 
from the vicinity of the Forest. 
In the Walthamstow Reservoirs are islands covered with 
brushwood and small trees. On these islands otters are living 
114 See The Life of R. IV. Dale, of Iii i tniiu’h am, by liis Sou, A. W. 11 *. Dale, pp. 1-2 (Lond., 
1898). 
