2 Coward, ]\'ilIoiv Titjiionse in LancasJiire and CJiesJiirc. 



group, and the other Panis atricapilliis, named by 

 Linnseus from a Canadian bird. This we now take as 

 the representative of the Willow Tit group. 



Perhaps the most noticeable difference between the 

 two groups is in the colour of the cap ; in the Marsh Tits 

 it is blue-black and more or less glossed ; in the Willow 

 Tits it is sooty or brown-black, and without gloss. In 

 addition, the feathers which are thus coloured are longer 

 and more loosel}' arranged in the Willow than in the 

 Marsh Tits, and in the majority of the races are continued 

 further along the neck. 



In the next point of difference, the colour of the 

 edges of the secondaries, there is great variation, not 

 individual nor local but racial. In the extreme, the 

 typical palustris, represented in our islands by the sub- 

 specific form, Pariis palustris dresseri Stejneger, the pale 

 edgings are scarcely noticeable, but in the Norwegian 

 bird of the atricapillus group, Pariis atricapillus borealis 

 Selys-Longchamps, these edgings are so nearly white 

 that they give the impression of a white patch on the 

 closed wing of the bird. 



A slight structural difference is not so marked in our 

 subspecies as it is in some of the other forms. The two 

 outer tail-feathers are longer in the Marsh Tits than in 

 the Willow Tits, and the effect is to give a squarer 

 appearance to the spread tails of the Marsh group, or a 

 rounder, more graduated one to those of the Willow 

 group. Other differences, such as the amount of buff on 

 the flanks, are noticeable in certain subspecies, but are 

 not equally well marked in others. 



In 1897 Pastor Kleinschmidt and Dr. Hartert were 

 examining skins of the group in the British Museum 

 collection when they noticed two birds, obtained at 

 Hampstead, which approached the brown-headed rather 



