Notes and Letters on the Natural History of Norfolk: More Especially on the Birds and FishesBrowne, Thomas, Sir
History
Notes and Letters on the Natural History of Norfolk: More Especially on the Birds and Fishes
Browne, Thomas, Sir
Natural history -- England -- Norfolk
Haue you that handsome colourd [bird _crossed out_] jay [_see Note 49_]
answering the description of Garrulus Argentoratensis & may be called
the parret jay I haue one that was killed upon a tree about 5 yeares
ago.
Haue you a may chitt a small dark gray bird [_see Note 29_] about the
bignesse of a stint wch cometh about may & stayeth butt a moneth. a bird
of exceeding fattnesse and accounted a daintie dish. they are
plentifully taken in marshland and about wisbich.
Haue you a [caprimulgus or _written above_] dorhawke a bird as bigge as
[a] pigeon [_see Note 42_] with a wide throat bill as little as a
titmous & white fethers in the tayle & paned like an hawke.
Succinum rarò occurrit[107] pag 291 of yours. [Should be p. 219] not so
rarely on the coast of norfolk. tis usually found in small peeces [butt
_crossed out_] sometimes in peeces of a pound wayght. I haue one by mee
fat & fayre of x ounces wayght--jet more often found I haue an handsom
peece of xii ounces in wayet.
[107] Amber, writes Mr. Clement Reid, in a paper contributed by him
to the "Trans. Norf. and Nor. Nat. Soc." (iii., p. 601), "is found
on the Norfolk coast, usually mixed with the seaweed thrown up by
the Spring gales," but is very rarely found in place; as much as
three or four pounds are annually gathered near Cromer. The
quality, Mr. Rein says, is very good, but the dark transparent
lumps are most generally found. In a subsequent paper (_op. cit._,
iv., p. 248) he enumerates seven species of insects which have been
found enclosed, and in a third communication mentions an eighth.
Mr. A. S. Ford, as the result of an examination of a collection of
East-coast Amber made at Yarmouth (_op. cit._, v., p. 92), adds one
species of Hymenoptera, three of Coleoptera, two of Orthoptera,
with some Araneida, and remains of vegetable substances which had
not been identified.
The Jet found on the Norfolk coast differs considerably from the
Whitby Jet, and Mr. Reid, "Geology of the Country Round Cromer" (p.
133), believes that in all probability it was originally derived
from Lower Tertiary beds under the North Sea, a few miles from the
present coast. Mr. Savin estimates the average annual find of Jet
near Cromer at from ten to twenty pounds.
The doctor does not display his usual acumen when he rejects the
"ancient" opinion as to the vegetable origin of Amber, see
_Pseudodoxia_, book ii., chap. iv.; also letter from Earl of
Yarmouth to T. B. (Wilkin Edit. i., p. 411).
No. III.
[FOL. 40 _verso_.]
"_My third letter Sept xiii._"
Sr I receaued your courteous Letter and with all respects I now agayne
salute you.
The mola piscis is almost yearely taken on our coast [_see Note 58_]
this [last _crossed out_] year one was taken of about 2 hundred pounds
wayght diuers of them I haue opened & haue found many lyce sticking
close vnto thier gills whereof I send you some.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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