23* Lloyd's natural history. 



the other. When the young are able to fly, however, the 

 Reed-Warblers are oTten to be seen in the bushes, accom- 

 panied by their families, and in certain places they form quite 

 a little colony, the old birds feeding the young of the second 

 brood, while the first brood are flying about in the neighbour- 

 hood also. The species is even said to nest far away from 

 water; and Mr. Mitford says that he has known them to build 

 in lilac-bushes in his garden at Hampstead. 



Nest. — Made of dry grass and roots, with a little wool or 

 thistle-down. When built in the reeds, some of the latter are 

 generally intertwined in the nest. 



Eggs. — From four to six in number. Ground-colour, 

 greenish-white or greyish-white, and thickly mottled and 

 spotted with greenish-brown, often collecting round the larger 

 end of the egg, and forming a broad ring. The underlying 

 spots of violet-grey are so mixed with the overlying mark- 

 ings as to be difficult of observation, but they are in reality 

 very numerously represented. Axis, 07-075 inch; diam., 

 o-5-°'55- 



V. THE MARSH-WARBLER. ACROCEPHALUS PALUSTRIS. 



Sylvia palustris % Bechst, Orn. Taschenb., p. 186 (1802). 

 Acrocephalus palusiris, Dresser, B. Eur., ii., p. 573, pi. 87, 



fig. 2 (1876); Seeb., Cat. B. Brit. Mus., v., p. 101 



(1SS1); id. Br. B., i., p. 375 (1883); B. O. U. List Br. 



B., p. 19 (1883); Lilford, Col. Fig. Br. B., pt. iii. (1886); 



Saunders, Man., p. 93 (1889). 



Adult Male. — Similar to the Reed-Warbler, and very difficult 

 to distinguish from that species, but it may be recognised by 

 the olive tone of the plumage, which does not show the red- 

 dish brown colour of the rump, which is always more or less 

 perceptible in the Reed-W r arbler. The feet are also said to be 

 pale horn-brown, instead of slaty-brown as in the last-named 

 bird. Mr. Seebohm gives the measurements of the wing in the 

 Reed-Warbler as from 2 '35-2 # 7 inches,andof the Marsh-Warbler 

 from 2 -45 to 2'S ; but we find that in the few undoubted speci- 

 mens of the latter bird in the British Museum the wing is de- 

 cidedly longer in A.palustris than in A. streperus t and extends 

 further down the tail; that is to say, its tip reaehes to at least two- 



