258 THE BIRDS OF HELIGOLAND 



The plumage of this bird, though very simple, is nevertheless 

 attractive. All the upper and lower parts are of a uniform slaty- 

 blue grey (schiefer-hlaugraii), the colour on the breast and belly 

 being somewhat lighter than on the back. The crown and tail are 

 deep black, the flight-feathers blackish. The lower tail-coverts 

 present a remarkable and striking deviation from this otherwise 

 simple dress, being of a vivid reddish chestnut brown {kastanien- 

 rothbraun), almost exactly like the colour of the corresponding 

 feathers in the Waxwing. The bill and feet are black. 



The measurements of the Heligoland example are as follows : — 

 Total length, 7-20 ins. (183 mm.); length of the short and roundish 

 wings, 3-46 ins. (88 mm.); length of tail, 3-78 ins. (96 mm.); length 

 of tail uncovered by wings, 2-88 ins. (73 «Mn.); length of beak, 

 •67 in. (17 vim.); height of tarsus, 119 in. (30 mm.). 



Swainson's measurements {Fauna Bor. Amer.) are slightly 

 larger than the above. 



On the wing the fourth and fifth flight-feathers are longest, the 

 third only slightly shorter; the second is of the same length as 

 the eighth. In the tail, which is rounded, the outermost pair of 

 feathers is '78 in. (20 mm.) long, and the adjacent pair '39 in. 

 (10 mm.) shorter than the four inner pairs. 



The peculiar eggs of this Thrush are of striking beauty. The 

 coloration, though of a simple uniform bluish green, is of such depth 

 and richness as is not met with, even approximately, in the eggs of 

 any European species. The darkest eggs of the Hedge-sparrow are 

 beside them as light and pale as those of the Conmion Stonechat 

 are beside those of the Hedge-sparrow. Their measurements are : 

 Length, -98 in. (2.5 mm.) : breadth, -67 in. (17 971771.). 



This species is distributed as breeding bird over almost the 

 whole of North America, from Texas to Canada. 



82. — Brown Thrasher [Rostrothe Drossel]. 

 TURDUS RUFUS, Linu.i 



Tiirdns {Taxastoma) rufus. N;uniiann, xiii. ; Blasius, 



Naclitrdge, p. 54. 



Brown Thrush. Orpheus rufus. Audubon, Syn. of Birds of 



N. America, p. 88. 



Orpheus rufus. Richardson and Swaiiison, 



Faun. Bor. Amer., p. 189. 



The only example of this peculiar American species ever ob- 

 served here was caught late in the autumn of 1836, and, together 

 with a Sea Eagle shot by the same fowler — Claus Siemens — was 

 ' Harporhynchiis rufus (Linn.). 



