Note 17 — NOTES[H] ON CERTAIN BIRDS FOUND IN NORFOLK.

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.