Rev, H. B. Tristram on the Ornithology of Palestine. 89 



we occasionally met with this bird in the Upper Lebanon in the 

 month of June, where, no doubt, it was breeding. 



Very different in its manners, though not in its home, was 

 Petrocincia cyanea, the well-known Blue Thrush. All the year 

 round it is to be found wherever stones crop above the surface, 

 whether by the shore, on the hills, or especially among ruins, 

 but always solitary. Rarely ever were a male and female to be 

 seen together. I had scarcely expected to find it as I did, along 

 with the Black-and-white Kingfisher on the coast, sitting 

 among the surf-beaten rocks and feeding on saudhce and 

 shrimps. On two occasions I killed it from the shore, and had 

 to wade into the sea to secure my specimen. Unsociable as it 

 is, it yet frequents the dwellings of man, a taste for stonework 

 evidently overcoming all other prejudices; but nowhere is it 

 more thoroughly at home than among the ruins of a deserted 

 and untrodden Roman city, like Gerash, Rabbah, or Gadara. 

 The " vomitoria" of the amphitheatres are exactly to its liking; 

 and in the recesses of these it has its nest, the male meanwhile 

 perched on the top of an old column and uttering his dolorous 

 ditty. Mr. Cochrane and I took a nest with four fresh eggs on 

 April 2ud, in one of the robbers' caves in the Wady Hamam, 

 near the Sea of Galilee. The nest was conveniently placed on a 

 shelf far in, without any attempt at concealment, and was like 

 the nest of our Blackbird, with mud mingled with the straw, 

 instead of a shell of cow-dung. This bird is with good reason 

 believed to be the " sparrow that sitteth alone upon the house- 

 top " of the Psalmist. The young birds were fledged at the be- 

 ginning of May. The eggs are a very pale blue, sntaller than 

 those of the Tbrush. 



A link also between Ruticilla and Saxicola is to be found in 

 Bessornis albigularis (Plate I.). This bird was first described by 

 Herr von Pelzeln at Vienna in October 1863, under the name 

 of Saxicola albigularis, from Smyrna specimens of Dr. Kriiper's. 

 My reasons for changing the genus I shall give. De Filippi 

 (Viagg. in Persia, p. 347) has set forth a new genus, Irunia, and 

 described under it a bird as Irania finoti, which, so far as I can 

 make out, is nothing else than the female of the B. albigularis. 

 It is impossible, I think, for any one, on observing this beau- 



