[2] Browne seems to have had on the whole a fairly correct idea with regard to the migratory movements of the birds on the Norfolk coast where peculiar facilities exist for such observations, but of course he could have formed no notion of the extent to which they prevail, perhaps no species being altogether sedentary. The general line of the autumn migration for those which spend their summer in Northern Europe is south or south-west, returning in the spring by the reverse route; those which visit us in spring from Western Europe, or countries lying still more to the eastward, adopt what is known as the east to west route, and reverse the direction in the autumn; but this latter is as nothing compared with the vast number of immigrants by both routes in the early autumn, at which time, especially, the movements are so exceedingly complex that it would be impossible here to attempt to explain them, and the reader must be referred to Mr. Eagle Clarke's digest of the Reports of the Migration Committee of the British Association ("Report Brit. Ass. for 1876," pp. 451-477).

[3] The "Aquila" of Gesner here referred to is evidently the Golden Eagle, which species Browne is careful to mention that he had not met with in this county, and that the specimen he sent to Dr. Scarburgh, more than once mentioned, was brought from Ireland. This bird has never been recorded alive in Norfolk. Immature White-tailed Eagles, the "Halyætus" of the text, still occur almost every autumn or winter on this coast, but no mature example has hitherto been killed. Browne's friend, Sir Charles Scarburgh (1616-1694), was born in London, and is buried at Cranford, in Middlesex. He seems to have been greatly distinguished as an anatomist and physician. He was a friend of William Harvey, whom he succeeded as Lumleyan Lecturer at the College of Physicians (of which he was elected a fellow in 1650). Harvey, out of regard for his "lovinge friend" Dr. Scarburgh, bequeathed to him his "little silver instruments of surgerie" and his velvet gown. ("Dict. of Nat. Biog.") The Golden Eagle sent him by Browne was kept in the College of Physicians in Warwick Lane for two years.

[4] This species is a not unfrequent autumn visitor to the Broads and Rivers of Norfolk. Browne names it correctly, but there was much confusion with regard to this species in the minds of the old authors. Willughby knew the bird and calls it the "Bald Buzzard," but in describing its nesting site and eggs (probably not on his own authority,) evidently confounds it with the Marsh Harrier, for he says that "it builds upon the ground among reeds, and lays three or four large white eggs of a figure exactly elliptical, lesser than hens' eggs." See Note 6.

[5] The Glede, or Puttock, of Turner, once so plentiful, is now only an extremely rare visitor to Norfolk. In 1815, it appears from Hunt ("British Ornithology"), not to have been uncommon, but the same authority in his list of Norfolk Birds contributed to Stacey's "History" of that County, speaks of the Kite as having in 1829 become extremely rare. It probably ceased to nest in this County about the year 1830, or perhaps a little later. Browne's reason for its comparative scarcity about the City of Norwich, viz., the abundance of Ravens mentioned at p. 27 infra, is very interesting to us in the present day when Kites and Ravens are almost equally rare.

[6] It seems likely that Browne here refers to two species of Harrier, the Grey Buzzard being the male of the Hen Harrier (including of course Montagu's Harrier which was not discriminated till long after) in its grey adult plumage, whereas the Marsh Harrier, with its light yellow head, to which the word "bald" as then used might well be applied, would stand for the "Bald Buzzard." The Harriers, which were till long after the time he wrote extremely numerous, are generally called "Buzzards" by the natives, and it will be noticed at p. 15 infra, that what is doubtless intended for the Marsh Harrier is spoken of as an enemy to the Coots; also at p. 56, it is said that young Otters "have been found in the Buzzards nests," a very likely circumstance with so fierce a bird, and one of which I have an impression I have heard in recent years. The Hen Harrier is now an extremely rare bird with us; the Marsh Harrier still occasionally nests in the Broads, and Montagu's Harrier now and then attempts to rear a brood, but even should the parents succeed in escaping it is very seldom they carry their young with them. Professor Newton has kindly favoured me with the following additional interesting note on this bird. "The Marsh Harrier is certainly the 'Balbushardus' of Turner (1544), which, though he says it is bigger and longer than the ordinary Buteo, has a white patch on the head and is generally of a dark brown (fuscus) colour, hunting the banks of rivers, pools, and marshes, living by the capture of Ducks, and the black birds which the English call Coots (Coutas). This he, Turner, has himself very often seen, and he describes its habits correctly; adding that it also takes Rabbits occasionally. Gesner, 1555, quotes Turner, but refers the Bald Buzzard to the Osprey (which he figures), and so the mistake began. Certainly Willughby's Bald Buzzard is the Osprey, but his book was not published when Browne wrote."

[7] In the present day the Crane is only a rare straggler to this country generally at the seasons of its migration; that it was in times past abundant in suitable localities there is ample evidence; that it also bred in the fens of the Eastern Counties there is no reason to doubt, but very little direct evidence is forthcoming, therefore every fact bearing upon this point is of value. Had Sir Thomas Browne written with the intention of publishing his observations he would doubtless have told us much about this grand bird, which would have been of the greatest interest to modern ornithologists, but even the above brief remarks, as will be seen, are worthy of note.

With regard to the occurrence of the Crane in the fens of East Anglia we have the following evidence; its fossil remains have been found in the peat at Burwell, in Cambridgeshire, and in excavating the docks at Lynn. Turner, in his "Avium Historia," Coloniæ, 1544, speaks of having seen young Cranes in this country, and as he passed fifteen years at Cambridge, it was probably in that neighbourhood that he met with them; then again there is the Act of Parliament, passed in 1534 (25th Hen. VIII. c. ii.), prohibiting the taking of their eggs (amongst those of other species) under a penalty of twenty pence. All this is well known, but being desirous to ascertain whether any reference to the Crane was to be found in the records of the Corporation of Norwich, Mr. J. C. Tingey, F.S.A., the custodian of the Muniment Room, at my request, most kindly searched the accounts of the City Chamberlain between the years 1531 and 1549. He there found numerous entries of sums expended in the purchase of cranes, swans, porpoises, &c., as presents to the Dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk and others, and amongst them, on the 6th of June, 1543, a charge for a "yong pyper crane" from Hickling, which appears conclusive evidence of the breeding of this bird near Norwich at that time. (See "Transactions of the N. and N. Nat. Soc.," vii., pp. 160-170.)

In Wilkin's Edition of the Notes the statement, "I met" with Cranes in a dish should be, "I meet with," &c., as it is in the original. The occasion referred to was probably an entertainment given by the Mayor of Norwich, on the Guild day in 1663, which in that year fell on the 19th June; at this banquet Henry, Duke of Norfolk and the Hon. Henry Howard were present, and the latter presented to the City a silver basin and ewer of the value of £60. Can it be that even at that time young Cranes were to be obtained? otherwise the middle of June seems a most unseasonable time for such a dish; for in a copy of a curious old manuscript, dated 1605, and published in the 13th Volume of "Archæologia" (p. 315), entitled "A Breviate touching the Order and Government of a Nobleman's house," &c., there is a "Monthlie Table, for a Diatorie" for each month in the year, and the Crane appears only in the tables from November till March inclusive. The modern gourmet would view with disgust some of the dishes included in this "diatorie" if set before him—only to mention among birds, auks, stares, petterells, puffines, didapers, and martins. The crane being "in the dish" must not be subjected to the vulgar process of "kervyng," but in the stilted heraldic language of the day must be "desplayed," whereas a heron must be "dismembered" and a bittern "unjointed." The price of a crane varied from 3s. 4d. to 5s., and a fat swan from 3s. to 4s. The sum of 6d. mentioned in the le Strange Household-book, in the year 1533 (see "Archæologia," vol. xxv., p. 529), quoted in Yarrell's "British Birds," iii., p. 180, was only the reward for bringing in a crane killed on the estate. That Cranes must at times have been numerous in Norfolk in the sixteenth century is evident, for in an account of the presents sent to William Moore, Esq., of Loseley, on the occasion of the marriage of his daughter, on 3rd November, 1567, Mr. Balam, "out of Marshland in Norfolk," sent him nine cranes, nine swans, and sixteen bitterns, with a large number of other wild-fowl. "Archæologia," vol. xxxvi., p. 36.

[8] The "Elke" is an obsolete name for the Wild Swan (Cygnus musicus), which occurs in the present day in the same numbers and under precisely similar circumstances as Browne describes; but of course this was the only species of wild swan known to him. The remarkable recurvation of the trachea within the keel of the sternum, which also prevails to a greater or less degree in four out of the five or six species of Cygnus found in the Northern Hemisphere, did not escape Browne's notice, although he was not the first to describe it, and he rightly observes that this peculiarity is absent in the Mute Swan (C. olor), but exists in a different and even more exaggerated form in the Crane. He, however, was mistaken as to the extreme northerly range which he assigns to this species. So marked a feature as the absence of the "berry" on the beak of this species did not escape Browne's observation, and he refers to it in the eighth letter to Merrett, who in his second letter to Browne remarks "the difference in the elk's bill by you signified is remarkable to distinguish it from others of its kind," indicating that this distinction was previously unknown to him.

[9] As a rule the Gannet does not approach the shore, except to breed, but follows the shoals of fish far out at sea. The circumstance mentioned by Browne is by no means singular, and several such instances of storm-driven Gannets being captured far inland are recorded. The "Scotch Goose, Anser scoticus," mentioned further on (p. 13 infra), is also in all probability intended for the Gannet; it is the Anser Bassanus sive Scoticus of Jonston. The "Marshland" here mentioned is a tract of country reclaimed in ancient times from the sea, lying to the west of the town of Lynn, of some 57,000 acres in extent, and bordering upon the estuary of the Wash.

[10] Willughby ("Ornithology," English Ed., p. 348) gives a good description of the Great Skua (Stercorarius catarrhactes) under the name of Catarracta, a skin of which he says was sent him by Dr. Walter Needham, and rightly identified it with the Skua which Hoier sent to Clusius, but his figure is evidently drawn from a skin of the Great Black-backed Gull. Hoier, whose name so often occurs about this time in connection with birds from the north, was a physician, living at Bergen in Norway. The Great Skua still breeds in sadly reduced numbers on the Shetland and Faröe Islands, but is rarely met with in Norfolk.

[11] The bird here mentioned is doubtless the Great Northern Diver, Colymbus glacialis. In another place Browne again refers to it as Mergus maximus Farrensis, which Clusius ("Exotic.," p. 102) calls Mergus maximus Farrensis, a name used by Willughby as a synonym for his "Greatest Speckled Diver or Loon" (p. 341). This bird is known to our fishermen as the Herring Loon, the Red-throated and perhaps also the Black-throated Divers being called Sprat Loons. It is a pity Browne's "draught" is not forthcoming.

[12] The Oyster Catcher, or Sea Pie, is found in greater numbers on the north-west portion of the County of Norfolk than on the eastern shore; it breeds occasionally about Wells, where it is universally known as the "Dickey-bird."

[13] Browne here refers to the family in general terms. The various species of Gulls in their different stages of plumage were very puzzling to the Ornithologists of the last century, and it is often extremely difficult to say to what individual species they refer. By Larus major he would probably mean the Black-backed and Herring Gulls which are found on the shore all the year round, most frequently in the immature plumage, but they most abound "in herring time." By far the commonest species at all times is Browne's Larus alba or Puet, the Black-headed Gull. Large flocks of this species and L. canus frequent Breydon and the tidal shores, especially the young birds of the year. There are now two large breeding-places of the Black-headed Gull in Norfolk, a very old-established one at Scoulton Mere, and a more recent colony at Hoveton Broad. The former extensive gullery at Horsey, mentioned by Browne, has long since been banished by the drainage of the marsh they frequented, and it is probable that a small colony which bred on Ormesby Broad some forty years ago, owed its origin to their banishment from Horsey. They, in their turn, deserted Ormesby on the erection of the works for supplying Yarmouth with water about the year 1855, and fixed upon Hoveton as their new home, in which place, as at Scoulton, they are carefully preserved.

Professor Newton has been kind enough to furnish me with the following note on the Terns. "Larus cinereus of Aldrovandus (and afterwards of Jonston), is said to be of three kinds: one with red legs, apparently the Black-headed Gull, and figured by Jonston, the second with yellow legs and a slender curved black bill, the third with a pointed scarlet bill. Both these last were most likely Terns—and all these were grey above and white below. Gesner quotes Turner for Sterna, and there is no doubt that his bird of that name was a Black Tern; but Gesner says that it is the Stirn of the Frisians, and figures a white and grey bird with a black head only (most likely a Common Tern, but possibly one of the larger species), as Sterna, thus using the word in a more general sense, and it may have been so used in Browne's time. I see no impossibility in people having thought of eating Terns in those days [as to that see Note 7, p. 6 ante]. The Common Tern was most likely very abundant, and we know that the Black Tern was exceedingly common in certain reed-beds, as stated by Turner, and noisy beyond measure." The Great and Lesser Terns still nest in one or two localities on our coast, although as the result of great persecution in very reduced numbers. The Black Tern, or Mire Crow, has quite ceased to do so.

[14] Although it has been met with in Norfolk, more frequently than perhaps in any other part of England, the Stork was never other than a rare spring and autumn visitor to Norfolk. Turner writes of it in 1544 as unknown in England, save as a captive, and Merrett a hundred years later says it rarely flies hither, which is equally true at the present time. Hewittson ("Eggs of Brit. Birds," Ed. 3, ii., p. 309; under Crane) was evidently misled by some remarks made by Evelyn, who visited Sir Thomas Browne in Norwich in October, 1671, and says in his diary that he saw Browne's "Collection of the eggs of all the fowl and birds he could procure; that country, especially the promontory of Norfolk, being frequented, as he said, by several birds which seldom or never go further into the land—as cranes, storks, eagles, and a variety of water-fowl." From this Hewitson infers that the Stork bred in Norfolk, a construction which the somewhat ambiguously worded passage will certainly not bear. I imagine collections of eggs were not very common in Browne's time.

[15] This interesting record has recently been supplemented by a much earlier record of the breeding of the "Popeler," or Shovelard, in Norfolk. Professor Newton ("Transactions of N. and N. Nat. Soc.," vi., p. 158) has called attention to an ancient document bearing date A.D. 1300, instituting a commission to inquire into the harrying of the eyries of these and other birds, &c., at Cantley and other places in Norfolk. Documents also exist, showing that in 1523 they nested at Fulham in Middlesex, and in 1570 in West Sussex, as pointed out by Mr. Harting in the "Zoologist" for 1877, p. 425, and 1886, p. 81, in each case constructing their nests in trees. At what precise date this bird ceased to breed in Norfolk and Suffolk is unknown, but Sir T. Browne's statement that they were "shot by fowlers not for their meat, butt the handsomenesse of the same," probably explains the circumstances which brought about that event. The Spoonbill visits Norfolk regularly every spring in small parties now more numerously than a few years since, which possibly may be accounted for by the destruction of nearly all its breeding-places in Holland, and it is possible that with due encouragement it might again be induced to breed in some of the localities in the Broads still suitable for the purpose.

[16] The Cormorant continued to nest in the trees on the shore of Fritton Lake for many years after Sir T. Browne's time. A manuscript note in a copy of Berkenhout's "Natural History of Great Britain and Ireland," published in 1769, is descriptive of a Cormorant killed at Belton Decoy (near the same lake) on the 11th September, 1775, and also states that "a vast number of these birds, even to some thousands, roost every night upon the trees," being in the neighbourhood of the decoy they are never shot, and "build their nests upon the top of these trees." According to Mr. Lubbock ("Fauna of Norf.," Ed. 2, p. 174), "in 1825 there were many nests at Herringfleet, also on Fritton Lake, and in 1827 not one." We may therefore assume that they ceased to nest at Herringfleet in 1825 or 1826. It will be noticed that Browne made free use of young Cormorants in his experiments as to the properties of certain drugs (cf. Wilkin, iv., p. 452), which would seem to indicate that he could obtain a plentiful supply of these birds. When the Cormorants ceased to breed at Reedham is unknown. They are not unfrequently seen now, generally in spring and autumn. The Rock Cormorant was possibly the Crested Cormorant or Shag.

[17] Willughby's first acquaintance with the adult Manx Shearwater ("Ornithology," p. 334) was from a drawing sent him by Sir T. Browne, who describes the bird, as above, under the accepted name of Shearwater, and Willughby's excellent figure on plate lxvii. (which plate I believe is not to be found in some copies of the "Ornithology," and to which there is no reference in the text) has all the appearance of having been drawn from life. The drawing here referred to is mentioned by Ray in his "Collection of English words not generally known," as having been received, with others, from the "learned and deservedly famous Sir Thomas Browne, of Norwich." George Edwards ("Gleanings of Nat. Hist.," vii., p. 315), prior to 1764. says that he went to the British Museum and examined Browne's "old draught," but I could not find it among any of the papers I examined. In Browne's fourth letter to Merrett, by an error in the transcription, he is made by Wilkin to say that he kept twenty of these birds alive for five weeks; in the MS. it is clearly only two.

[18] Barnacle and Brent Geese as we know them, the first by no means common here; the Wild Goose, probably Anser cinereus; the Scotch Goose (see Note 9), probably the Gannet; and the Bergander, an old name for the Sheld-drake, as used by Turner in 1544, and derived from the Dutch Berg-eende, German Bergente ("Dict. Birds," p. 835). Browne's statement that this bird formerly bred about Northwold, or as it is even now occasionally called by the natives, "Norrold," some twenty miles from the sea; or, as he says, in the fourth letter to Merrett, "abounding in vast and spatious commons," is very interesting, although not a solitary instance, for I am informed that this bird breeds in the present day on the Gull Lake, Twig Moor, in Lincolnshire; but that it should have chosen such a nesting site is not more surprising than the fact of the Ring Plover, quite as strictly a marine species, frequenting the extensive sandy warrens about Thetford and Brandon, near the south-west border of the county, for the same purpose, as they still continue to do. But for Browne's mention of the circumstance we should not have been aware of this singular departure from the normal nesting habits of the Sheld-duck, as no tradition I believe exists on the subject, and at present it only nests in the sand-hills in some parts of the coast of N.W. Norfolk.

[19] This evidently refers to the Goosander, which as he says in another place most answers to the Merganser.

[20] This well describes the Great-crested Grebe, which Browne rightly says comes to us about the month of April. Browne notices the peculiar formation of the tibia in this family of birds, but it had long been known. The next, named Mergus acutirostris cinereus, is most likely the same species in winter plumage. The other birds mentioned are Mergus minor, the Little Grebe or Dabchick, and M. serratus, the Red-breasted Merganser, even now known as the "Saw-bill."

[21] The Smew, male and female, or either in the immature plumage are here referred to.

[I] Fols. 10 and 11 are (10 written on both sides) on the "Ostridge," vide Wilkin, Vol. 4, p. 337-9. The paper is a different size, 11-1/2 by 7-1/2, and the article is evidently bound out of place.

[22] The local names of the various Ducks are simply legion and differ both in time and place, not to mention the confusion occasioned by sex and season when these birds were not so well understood as at present. Many such names are quite lost, as "Ankers" and "Noblets," but the following are a few examples: Adult Smew, White Nun; female or immature Smew, Wesel Coot; the Wigeon was known as the Smee, Whewer, or Whim; the Tufted Duck, Arts or Arps; the Gadwall, Grey Duck or Rodge; the Pochard, Dunbird; the Shoveller, Beck or Kertlutock (Hunt); Pintail, Sea Pheasant or Cracker; Long-tailed Duck, Mealy Bird; Golden Eye, Morillon or Rattle-wing; Scaup, Grey-back, and on Breydon White-nosed Day Fowl; Scoter, Whilk; Velvet Scoter, Double Scoter (Hunt); Teal, Crick; Garganey, Summer Teal, Pied Wigeon, Cricket Teal; other names might be mentioned, and some will be found in the notes which will follow. Anas platyrhincus here mentioned is the Shoveller. It may seem strange that the abundance of Teal should in any way be attributed to the number of Decoys, but such was really the case, the quiet and shelter afforded by these extensive preserves being very favourable to the increase of all the members of the Duck family, especially to those breeding in their immediate neighbourhood. In the returns of the old Decoys, Teal figured largely; in the present day they form a very much smaller proportion of the spoils.

[23] In the present day the Coots have nothing to fear from Kites and little from Moor Buzzards; it may be that it is in consequence of this that they have discontinued the practice of twining the rushes and reeds above their nests in the manner mentioned above as being an unnecessary precaution. I have, however, in some cases noticed some approach to this practice. The Coot, although fairly numerous on the Broads, appears to be far less so than formerly. Lubbock, in his "Fauna of Norfolk," says on asking a Broadman how many Coots there were on Hickling Broad, his reply was, "About an acre and a half," referring to their practice of swimming evenly at regular distances from each other without huddling together in dense masses, like wild-fowl.

I am indebted to Professor Newton for the following additional note on the Coot. He says "Turner, and after him Gesner, was puzzled as to what was the Fulica of classical writers (Virgil and others), and thought it to be some kind of Gull; but the Fulica of later authors was certainly the Coot, as shown by Gesner's figure."

[24] Moor-hens are of course numerous in all suitable localities, and the Water Rail is still fairly common, but its eggs have a market value and are (or were) sadly stolen; a few years ago a London dealer is said to have received over 200 eggs of this bird in one season from Yarmouth.

[25] There is every reason to believe that a species of Pelican, probably from its size P. crispus, was formerly an inhabitant of the East Anglian Fens; its bones have been found in the peat on three occasions, one of these being the bone of a bird so young as to show that it must have been bred in the locality, and therefore that the species was a true native and not a casual visitant. Bones of a species of Pelican have also been found in the remains of lake-dwellings at Glastonbury, in Somersetshire.

With regard to the species of the bird recorded by Browne and its origin, he is careful to point out that a Pelican had about that time escaped from the King's collection in St. James' Park, and to surmise that it might be the same bird; from what follows this seems probable, but as P. onocrotalus is believed to stray occasionally into the northern parts of Germany and France ("Dict. of Birds," p. 702) the occurrence of that species on the East Coast of Britain, where, even at present, it would find a state of things in every way suited to its requirements (guns excepted), would not be very extraordinary. Browne's Pelican was killed in May, 1663, and although Dr. Edward Browne visited St. James' Park in February, 1664, and saw "many strange creatures," including the Stork with the wooden leg (mentioned by Evelyn), he says nothing of the Pelicans, still it may be that it was from him that his father heard of the escape. Evelyn, in his Diary, mentioned that he visited St. James' Park on February 9th, 1665, and speaks of only one Pelican, which he states was brought from Astrakan by the Russian Ambassador as a present to the King; Willughby says distinctly that the Emperor of Russia sent the King two Pelicans, and further, that he took the description in his "Ornithology" from a bird in the Royal Aviary, St. James' Park, near Westminster; it seems therefore highly probable that Browne's bird was one of these which had escaped from confinement. But a rather curious circumstance arises out of this, the bird described by Willughby does not appear to be P. onocrotalus, but a similar species, P. roseus, found chiefly in Indio-China and westward to South-eastern Europe, but occurring as far west as the River Volga ("Cat. of Birds," B. M., xxvi., p. 466). In this Mr. Ogilvie Grant, the author of that section of the Catalogue, whom I consulted, agrees with me, and the locality whence the birds were derived, mentioned by Willughby, renders not unlikely. Onocrotalus in Browne's time was a general term for "the Pelican," and he probably knew but one species and one individual, the escaped bird from Charles II.'s Aviary. Browne's very miscellaneous collection was destroyed by the authorities at the time of the plague (see ninth letter to Merrett), and probably the remains of this Pelican perished with the rest.