WARBLERS 53 



Nettlecreeper, from its habit of nesting amongst 

 nettles and rank herbage in ditches. The older 

 name of Bahillard seems to have died out. It is 

 rare in Scotland, in Dumfriesshire, near Aberdeen 

 Nov. 1880, and twice in Orkney in the autumn of 

 1893 and 1896 {Ann. Scot. Nat. Hist., 1897, p. 160, 

 and Ihis, 1898, p. 157). Until lately unknown in 

 Ireland. On Oct. 1, 1890, at 4 p.m., wind light, 

 S.W., Mr. James, light-keeper on the Tearaght Rock, 

 off Kerry, shot a Lesser Whitethroat, which he for- 

 warded to Mr. R. M. Barrington {Zool, 1891, p. 186, 

 and Irish Nat., 1892, p. 3). A circumstance not 

 noticed in the text-books is that this bird does not 

 acquire the beautiful pearly-white iris until it is two 

 years old, which has caused it to be generally over- 

 looked. The breast of the cock bird also does not ac- 

 quire its full roseate tinge until the second summer. 



DARTFORD WARBLER. Sylvia undata, Boddaert. 

 Length, 5 in, ; wing, 2*25 in. ; tarsus, '8 in. 



So named on being first noticed as a British 

 bird at Dartford in Kent by Latham in 1773. 

 Resident in the south of England ; rare in the 

 midland and northern counties ; unknown in Scot- 

 land and Ireland. Frequents large furzy commons, 

 and patches of gorse on the downs, chiefly in Kent, 

 Surrey, Sussex, and Hants, and the heath-lands of 

 Dorsetshire. The following localities for the species, 

 which is seldom met with farther north than lat. 52", 

 may be mentioned as indicating the northern limits 

 of its distribution : — 



