means certain that there was not a male bird—in fact, he remained till dark, after shooting the female, expecting its arrival, and spent the two following days in the wood with the same object, and suggests that the fact of there being several people working round the wood (a very small one) might have scared it away. As to the eggs being quite fresh, he says he did not allow the bird time to sit before shooting her. Mr. Noble's third reason—should the bird be an escape—may be of importance as a means of identification. The claw of one of the toes of the left foot is broken, which may have been done by shot, and the inner toe of the right foot is missing, evidently an old injury, as the stump is quite healed. Should such a bird have been missed about the time named, I hope this feature may recall it to the memory of its former owner. The question arises, would a trained Falcon, on obtaining its liberty, construct a nest and lay its complement of eggs unaccompanied by a mate? A female Goshawk has produced eggs in Mr. Gurney's aviary, but of course under circumstances which were not favourable to the construction of a nest. Prof. Newton, however, has called attention to a very interesting passage in Gairdner's edition of the 'Paston Letters' (see Lubbock's 'Fauna of Norfolk,' edition 1879, p. 225), which shows that these trained Falcons were so far sedentary in their habits that, provided the locality were suitable, a liberated bird might be expected to remain and nest. John Paston, writing to his brother in November, 1472, laments that a Goshawk sent him was so injured in transit that "she shall never serve but to lay egges." He therefore proposes to "cast hyr in Thorpe wood and a tarsell with hyr," that she might "eyer." This seems to indicate not only that the breeding of the Goshawk in the extensive woods which at that date surrounded the city of Norwich was not an unlooked-for event, but also, as Prof. Newton remarks, that the writer had some experience of a similar case; it will be noticed, however, that he proposed to supply her with a "tarsell."—Thomas Southwell (Norwich).
Flamingo in Merionethshire.— Early in October last my brother, Mr. M.H.E. Haigh, wrote to me stating that, after a heavy gale from the south on the 26th and 27th of September, he had seen, on the 28th, a large bird on the estuary known as the "Traeth-bach," which, from his description, I had no doubt was a Flamingo (Phœnicopterus roseus). I was, however, unable to come down until the 20th of October, and on the following day succeeded in shooting the bird. It was excessively wild, rising, as a rule, nearly a quarter of a mile off, and flying round the estuary in large circles for quite twenty minutes each time it was put up. We finally got a shot at about ninenty yards with a heavy shoulder gun by allowing the boat to drift with the tide. It was in good condition, and showed no sign of
