but as both the Marsworth and Wilstone reservoirs are hard on the borders of Buckinghamshire, they must be taken into consideration when treating of the ornis of this county, at the risk of being accused of overstepping our boundary. We are very sorry to say that owing to the drought of the last three or four years, and the fact that the canal company are pumping out the water in great quantities, the Tring reservoirs are decreasing in volume at an alarming rate and are being abandoned by some of the more interesting breeding birds; and it is to be feared that very shortly nearly all the ornithological interest attached to these waters will have entirely vanished. A very fine place for water birds is the Halton (or Weston Turville) reservoir, which has so far retained its former volume of water.
We are very much obliged to a number of friends and correspondents who have most kindly supplied us with notes of their observations on birds. The Rev. Hubert D. Astley, until recently residing at Chequers Court, gave us notes on the birds of that district. Mr. A. Heneage Cocks supplied us with records from the neighbourhood of High Wycombe and the Thames. Mr. Alan F. Grossman supplied us with some observations made in south Buckinghamshire, and from Messrs. Heatley Noble and Charles J. Wilson we received several interesting communications.
Colonel Goodall of Dinton Hall extracted most valuable information from an old manuscript work at Dinton Hall, in which birds obtained in that neighbourhood are well figured and described. This work was commenced by his great grandfather, Sir John van Hatten, in 1772, and the notes are continued by the Rev. W. Goodall into the beginning of the nineteenth century. Both authors of this treatise have been permitted to look over the work and have verified the statements made in it.
Only one book on the birds of the county exists at the present. In 1868 appeared a handsome little volume of 232 pages entitled The Birds of Berkshire and Buckinghamshire, by Alexander W. M. Clark Kennedy, ' an Eton Boy.' This is a very praiseworthy little book, full of carefully collected and valuable information, though not without its faults. The author was not more than sixteen years old, and it is a pity that he did not endeavour to improve upon this work later and with a more mature experience.
We have strictly followed the nomenclature of Mr. Howard Saunders's list by the editors' request, but in a few cases where we consider a different nomenclature preferable we have, with the permission of the editors, added a note to that effect.
1. Missel-Thrush. Turdus viscivorus, Linn.
Not at all scarce, breeding in all suitable woods, parks and gardens. In autumn and winter they go about in flocks, many of which are doubtless migrants from north Europe.
2. Song-Thrush. Turdus musicus, Linn.
Very common and, like the missel-thrush and blackbird, a very early breeder. The majority of thrushes in the midland counties do not migrate, but stay throughout the
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