540 MOTACILLlDiE. 



tion of a variety from Zealand, wliich he said " a prsecedente 

 differt capiti dorso concolore" ; though at the same time 

 he suggested that the difference arose from age or sex. 

 Briinnich's specimen may possibly have been an example of 

 the British form, which is known to occur occasionally in 

 Denmark, but that cannot be proved. 



It is however certain that Mr. Gould was forestalled in 

 his recognition of our Pied Wagtail as a distinct " species" ; 

 for, in October, 1820, Temmiuck (Man.d'Orn. Ed. 2, i.p.253) 

 published the description of a bird which is unquestionably 

 identical with it. This he called Motacilla higuhris, believ- 

 ing that by that name Pallas had described and designated 

 it, whereas Pallas never did any such thing.* Vieillot, too, 

 in the " Ornithologie " of the ' Encyclopedie Methodique ' 

 (ii. p. 404), about the same time f and under the same name, 

 most accurately described the present bird as distinct from 

 M. alha, saying also that the former was of regular passage 

 in February and March near Abbeville and Rouen, but not 

 stopping there to breed, and that it was easily known by its 

 note from the latter which stayed the whole summer. He 

 adds that the specific name was given by Natterer, I who how- 

 ever is not known to have published anything on the subject. 



It is to be remarked, moreover, that while Temminck, 

 having the supposed species of Pallas in his imagination, 

 referred certain eastern specimens to the bird of Western 

 Europe, Vieillot, by his clear account of the latter, fixed 

 upon it the name luguhris, which according to all rule it 



* There was some excuse for this mistake since Pallas's great work, * Zoograpliia 

 Rosso-Asiatica,' was not at that time accessible to Temminck, though printed in 

 1811. A few copies of the first volume were, it is stated, distributed, and 

 hence its contents have an allowable claim to date from that year ; but neither of 

 the succeeding volumes were then issued, nor was the whole work to be generally 

 procured until 1831. 



f The Uvraison containing this page (as Mr. Bradshaw, the librarian of the 

 University of Cambridge, kindly took the trouble to ascertain) was published by 

 7th January, 1821. Prof. A. Milne-Edwards obligingly sends the information that 

 it appeared in December, 1820. The title-pages to the work were not issued until 

 1823, and bear that date. 



J This word is spelt "Nater", but there can hardly be a doubt that it is a 

 misprint. 



