A VES. 63 



is found in Egypt, Nubia, Abyssinia, Arabia, and the Persian and Indian 

 deserts. In habits it differs from its congener, sweeping the desert plains 

 rather than soaring over the mountain cliffs. 



FAMILY, CERTHIID.E. 



108. Tichodroina niuraria. (Linn. Syst. Nat. i., p. 184.) Wall 

 Creeper. 



The beautiful Creeper, the ' Butterfly Bird ' of the French, is common 

 throughout the year in all the rocky gorges of Central and Northern 

 Palestine, from the glens opening on the plain of Gennesaret to the 

 highest cliffs of Lebanon. No ornithological sight is more interesting 

 than the movements of this richly coloured bird as it flits along the face 

 of a line of cliffs, spreading its brilliant crimson wings at each sidling 

 jerk. 



The Wall Creeper is found in the mountain regions of all Central 

 and Southern Europe and Asia, from Spain to the Himalayas and 

 China. 



FAMILY, NECTARINIID^. 



109. Cinnyris osece. Bonap. Comptes Rendus. xlii., Pt. 2, p. 765. 

 Palestine Sun- Bird. 



Plate VIII. 



To the naturalist this is perhaps the most interesting species of the 

 whole Palestinian Avifauna. In the first place, it belongs to a truly tropical 

 family. In the second place, it is absolutely peculiar, so far as we know, to 

 the Holy Land, and within its limits is confined to a very narrow strip of 

 territory ; and lastly, we must travel very far from Palestine east or south 

 to find another representative of the numerous Sun-bird family. We must 

 go either to India or far up the Nile into Nubia. At least 135 species of 

 Sun-bird are known, confined entirely to the warmer parts of the Old 

 World, to Southern Asia and all its islands, as far as North Australia, to 

 Africa, south of the Sahara, and to the Mascarene Islands and Madagascar. 

 They are unknown in the New World and in Oceania. In habits they 



