NOTES ON VARIOUS SPECIES OF BRITISH BIRDS. 135 



gaster), while he referred, a bird from Ireland to the latter, 

 because it " agrees closely with specimens from Sweden." 



In 1881 Sharpe cautioned his readers against the above 

 statement, declaring that " the specimens " (Dresser 

 mentioned only one !) referred to by Mr. Dresser were 

 only young birds of the year of the ordinary C. aquaticus 

 after their first moult, at which time they were hardly 

 distinguishable from C. cinclus (the Scandinavian form). 



Sharpe 's view was repeated and generalized by Seebohm 

 two years later. The same author then added that birds 

 from the Peak of Derbyshire, 1,500 feet above the sea, 

 were darker than those which are found lower down the 

 valleys, a statement afterwards repeated by various 

 authors, among others by Saunders, who makes a similar 

 observation with regard to the Dippers in the Pyrenees. 



Sharpe, in 1894, called the British Dippers Cinclus 

 aquaticus, and admitted C. cinclus from Scandinavia as a 

 visitor to the eastern counties of England. In 1902 

 Tschusi separated the British Dipper as C. c. britannicus. 



I have tried to examine as many British Dippers as 

 possible and have come to the following conclusions : — 



Dresser, in 1874, was nearest to the truth, when he 

 considered the Irish Dipper to be different from those 

 of England and Scotland. Sharpe, on the other hand, 

 had apparently not seen the specimen on which Dresser 

 based his statement, for young British Dippers do not 

 look like adult birds of the Irish form. 



Seebohm's statement, that birds from the Peak of 

 Derbyshire were different from those of lower altitudes, 

 and more like Swedish ones, was apparently based on the 

 comparison of one or two specimens and generalized 

 without any reason whatever. Saunders' assertions, 

 that Pyrenean birds from higher elevations differed from 

 those of the valleys, and that the Pyrenean form is hke 

 the Norwegian one, are not quite correct ; it is true that 

 the Pyrenean Dipper differs from that of Spain, but all 

 Pyrenean birds, as far as I have been able to ascertain, 

 belong to a distinct race, C. cinclus pyrenaicus of Dresser, 



