Oniilhology of the Var ^c. 371 



found breeding) or T. pilaris, is called a " Chastria '' ; the 

 smaller kinds, that is to say, T. musicvs and T. iliacus, are 

 "Toudres/'' or, according to another writer, "Tourdres/^ 

 but I had not an opportunity of bearing these names 

 pronounced. Some Blackbirds in the Grasse market seemed 

 very grey, and there are several curious variations in the 

 Marseilles Museum, while P. Roux describes a pied race 

 which seems to have been perpetuated for some years. 



Redwing. Turdus iliacus. 



The origin o£ many of our bird-names may be traced to 

 the French language; for example, in Britain a Thrush is 

 called by country people a " Mavish/' but, as Mr. Howard 

 Saunders remarks, ''Mauvis^^ in French means a Redwing, 

 and it is so understood in Provence, where the bird is 

 regularly met with in winter. It is a name, too, which has 

 a southern signification, for Mr. Wharton understands it to 

 mean the bird which destroys the vine, i. e. eats the grapes. 



Ring-Ouzel. Turdus torquatus. 



It is not known how far south T. torquatus goes in 

 winter. It was met with, I believe, by Lord Lilford in 

 the Var, and I shot it in Algeria in March, but its dis- 

 tribution is complicated by its affinity to T. alpestris, which 

 species has been too recently separated to say whether it is 

 found in the Var at all or only on migration. Pellicot, a 

 very accurate observer, distinguishes between the " Merle a 

 plastron'^ and the " Merle a plastron blanc " or ''Grand 

 Merle de Montague.-" 



Blue Thrush. Monticola cyanvs. " Petrocincle bleu.^'' 



Mr. W. H. St. Quintin saw considerable numbers of this 

 species at Grasse, and once observed M. saxatilis (' The Field,' 

 May 12th, 1900), but the only Blue Thrush seen by me was 

 in a Cannes shop. Jaubert and Barthelemy-Lapommeraye 

 consider the " Merle azure " of Crespon to be a hybrid 

 between the two species, an opinion shared by Suchetet. In 

 the Abbe Joseran's list M. saxatilis is included, and not 

 M. cyanus, but Duval- Jouvc considered the latter to be 

 stationarv. Canon Tristram met with M. cyanus at Cassis. 



