Mr. Thompson on the Birds of Ireland. 17 



when they had a little recovered, and were again within a foot 

 of each other ready to recommence the charge, a duck that 

 had witnessed the combat quickly waddled up, and in the 

 most gentle and pacific manner shoved with its bill the one to 

 the right further in that direction, and the one to the left further 

 so, thus evidently separating them to prevent a renewal of the 

 conflict. 



In snares set for small birds during frosty I have remarked 

 that redbreasts were generally the first victims. Their ex- 

 treme tameness before a fall of snow wherever we meet with 

 them unerringly shows their sensibility to the coming change, 

 and has in several instances led me to prognosticate it, and 

 always with certainty, when no other indication was percept- 

 ible. 



Black Redtail, Sylvia Tithys, Scop. — The redstart no- 

 ticed by me in the Zoological Proceedings for 1834 (p. 30.) 

 as the Phoenicura ruticilla, on the authority of Robert Ball, 

 Esq., has since been proved by that gentleman to be the 

 rare British species S. Tithys. I am likewise informed that 

 in the autumn of 1818 or 1819 he shot five individuals 

 of this species at Youghal, county Cork, but of which, un- 

 fortunately, all that remains is one ill-preserved specimen. 

 A redstart was subsequently taken in a corn-store at Youghal, 

 and in June 1837 another was seen in a garden within the 

 town ; but whether these also were the S. Tithys cannot now 

 be determined. 



In the counties of Dublin and Armagh I have heard of the 

 redstarts occurrence, but have been unable to learn anything 

 satisfactory on the subject. 



It appears somewhat strange that the common species P. 

 ruticilla should not be a regular summer visitant to any part 

 of Ireland, for in no country are their localities apparently 

 better suited to it : of these I judge from the haunts in which 

 it has occurred to me in Westmoreland and Derbyshire, and 

 those in which I very frequently met either with it, or some 

 of the closely allied Phoenicura (Swainson) in Switzerland. 



Grasshopper Warbler, Sylvia Locustella, Lath. — 

 Montagu states that he has found this bird in Ireland (Orn. 

 Diet.), and Templeton remarks that it is "not very uncommon 



Ann, Nat. Hist. Vol. 1.— No. 1. March 1838. c 



