NOTES. 75 



day, and under the guidance of his son the Rev. C. F. 

 TomHnson, had no difficulty in finding the bird, which 

 was singing steadily. As is well known, the Wood-Wren 

 {Phylloscopus sihilatrix) has two phases of song : firstly, the 

 well-known trill with its premonitory notes, which may be 

 written " Ip, sip, sipp, sippsipp, sipsipp, srreeeeee — ," and 

 a loud and somewhat melodious " Wheeou, wheeou, wheeou," 

 which is much less commonly heard, but may occasionally be 

 uttered twice or three times in succession. The latter notes 

 are also sometimes uttered during slow flight. This bird 

 (which I have no doubt was a Wood- Wren) began its song 

 with the familiar " Ip, sip," but immediately afterwards 

 burst into a full-throated bravura song, much resembling 

 the loud burst of melody of the Common Wren, but with one 

 or two notes which recalled the Tree-Pipit. It is impossible 

 to write down this song in words, but it was a continuous 

 flow of clear and varied notes, rather longer than the average 

 Wren's song, and was uttered with apparent exertion and 

 widely-opened bill. I should never have thought it possible 

 for any bird of this genus to sing in a way which challenged 

 comparison with many of our Sylvise. Two or three times 

 it varied this performance by singing the " Wheeou " phase, 

 exactly as the ordinary Wood- Wren does, on one occasion 

 flying slowly from tree to tree while singing. By June 10th, 

 it had ceased to sing, and I could find no trace of it in its 

 former haunts, although Wood- Wrens were still in song 

 in several places in the same wood. F. C. R. Jourdain. 



WREN REARING A BROOD IN AN OLD NEST. 



In a garden at Slough there is a rustic summer-house. The 

 top of the entrance has a valance-board, outside the rustic 

 work, on each side. On one side under the valance-board 

 I saw, early in April, a last-year's nest of a Wren {Troglodytes 

 parvulus). It was not touched. Early in June I went to 

 look at it, and saw a Wren fly out. Since then the young 

 birds have been seen several times, and on June 20th they 

 were fledged. T. R. Ward. 



SOUTHERN GREY SHRIKE IN SUSSEX. 



On January 2nd, 1911, a male Southern Grey Shrike {Lanius 

 meridionalis) was shot near Pett, Hastings, Sussex, and was 

 examined in the flesh by Mr. Ruskin Butterfield. This, I 

 beheve, is the third example of this species in Great Britain. 



J. B. Nichols. 



[The only previous example I know of is that recorded 



by Mr. J. H. Gurney as obtained near Norwich in December, 



