126 GREY WAGTAIL. 



found in summer across Asia (south of about 67° N. lat.) to Persia, 

 Turkestan, the Himalayas, Northern China and Japan ; wintering as 

 far south as the Indo-Malayan islands, and down to Somali-land in 

 Africa. 



The nest is placed usually near a stream, in some rugged portion 

 of a bank, occasionally among the stems of a shrub, frequently in a 

 rough stone wall or some crevice of the rocks. In the Pyrenees, 

 where the Grey Wagtail is very abundant, I observed a nest behind 

 a pair of votive crutches at the entrance to the grotto at Lourdes. 

 The materials employed are moss, soft grass and fine roots, with 

 abundance of hair for a lining. The eggs, usually 5 in number, are 

 greyish-white, mottled with pale clay-colour, and sometimes marked 

 with a few black hair-streaks at the larger end : measurements 75 

 by -55 in. Two broods are occasionally reared in the season; the 

 first eggs being laid in April ; and the male takes his share in the 

 task of incubation. The food consists of aquatic and other insects, 

 small molluscs and crustaceans ; and at the baths of Dax in the 

 Landes, a pair of birds which frequented the courtyard of the hotel 

 used to enter the open windows of the thronged corridors, with the 

 utmost familiarity, in search of flies. The call-note is a sharply 

 uttered zis zi. In its constant and rapid movements this species 

 resembles its allies, but it is decidedly more addicted to perching on 

 trees by the side of streams. 



The adult male in breeding-plumage has the crown and ear-coverts 

 slate-grey, with a narrow white streak above the eye ; below the lores, 

 which are black, a broad white line runs on each side to the nape, which 

 is slate-grey, as are the mantle and rump ; wing-feathers brownish- 

 black, the long secondaries margined with bufhsh-white ; upper tail- 

 coverts greenish-yellow ; the outside pair of tail-feathers white, the 

 next two pairs also white wath a black stripe along part of the outer 

 web, the remainder brownish-black ; chin and throat black ; breast 

 to lower tail-coverts sulphur-yellow ; bill dark brown ; legs and feet 

 pale brown. Length from 7 to 7 -5 in., depending upon the length 

 of the tail, which is variable; wing t^-t^ in. The female has a 

 shorter tail than the male, and her tints are duller and greener, while 

 on the throat she has far less black, and usually none at all. That 

 part becomes white in both sexes in autumn, when a buff tint 

 appears on the breast. The young bird is browner than the female, 

 and its eye-stripe is buff. This species has bred, in captivity, with 

 the Pied Wagtail, and the hybrids proved fertile. 



