14 Mr. H. Seebohra on the Ornithology of Siberia. 



L. rubescens of Blyth. Jerdon seems to have been acquainted 

 with all three states of plumage. The young and adult in 

 summer plumage he describes under the name of L. certhiola 

 (Pall.); but doubtful of the identity of the Siberian and Indian 

 birds, he proposes the name of L. temporalis for the latter, 

 in case they should afterwards be found to be distinct. The 

 autumn plumage of the adult he describes as L. rubescens, 

 Blyth, but alludes to that ornithologist's opinion that it might 

 be identical with Pallas's bird. Salvadori's Calamodyta dories 

 is h. certhiola in winter plumage from Borneo. When I was 

 in Paris Tabbe David told me that the type of Locustella 

 minor, David et Oustalet, was lost ; but he assured me, what 

 I was already prepared to assert, that it is a bad species, and 

 the name must sink into a synonym of L. certhiola. Full 

 references to all these synonyms will appear in Dresser's 

 ' Birds of Europe.' 



Locustella ochotensis, Midd. 



Sylvia [Locustella) ochotensis, Midd. Sib. Reis. ii. p. 185 

 (1851). Young in first plumage. 



Sylvia [Locustella) certhiola, Midd. Sib. Reis. ii. p. 184 

 (1851, nee Pall.). Adult. 



Locustella japonica, Cassin, Proc. Ac. Sc. Phil. 1858, p. 194. 

 Young. 



Locustella subcerthiola, Swinhoe, Ibis, 1874, p. 154. Adult. 



Arundinax blakistoni, Swinhoe, Ibis, 1876, p. 332. Young 

 in first winter plumage. 



The synonymy of L. ochotensis and L. certhiola have 

 hitherto been in such hopeless confusion that I am glad to 

 have an opportunity of putting them in something like order. 

 When I was in St. Petersburg the curator of the Museum, 

 with the politeness so characteristic of the Russians, gave me 

 every facility for inspecting types and other interesting skins 

 in the collection. I found that all the skins collected by Mid- 

 dendorflf near the shores of the Sea of Ochotsk, lal)elled re- 

 spectively L. certhiola and L. ochotensis, belonged to one 

 species, the former being adult birds, and the latter young in 

 first plumage. The difference between them lay solely in the 



