ROSE-COLOURED STARLING. 21 
states that it has twice been killed on the Faroes; but its occurrence in 
Iceland has not yet been noticed. 
Like the Waxwing, the Rose-coloured Starling is preeminently gre- 
garious in the breeding-season; and, like that bird, it seems to vary its 
nesting-locality according to the abundance of food, generally selecting 
some district where locusts and grasshoppers abound. It breeds more or 
less regularly in Asia Minor and on the western shores of the Black Sea. 
The most westerly recorded instance of its breeding in large numbers is 
in Lombardy. At Villafranca, near Verona, in 1875 great numbers bred 
in the castle, having followed in the wake of a flight of locusts. They 
have not been known to breed in Palestine; but Tristram describes 
enormous numbers passing through on their spring migration. Eastwards 
they breed in South Russia and the Caucasus, Turkestan, and South 
Siberia, as far east as Lake Saisan. They have also been observed in 
North-west Persia and Afghanistan in spring. They winter in India in 
enormous numbers, and are occasionally found as far south as Ceylon. 
The most easterly locality recorded of this bird is the Andaman Islands, 
where flocks were seen by Col. Tytler in January (‘ Ibis,’ 1867, p. 331). 
At this season of the year, and on the spring and autumn migrations, they 
have occurred in almost every country of Hurope, from Spain in the west 
to Sweden in the north, and have been known to stray as far south as 
North Africa, one or two examples having been recorded from Egypt and 
Algeria. 
The Rose-coloured Starling, like the Black-headed Bunting, is one of 
the few birds which migrate east in autumn. The natural inference to be 
drawn from this fact is that when its habits of migration were formed 
it was exclusively an Asiatic species, which has gradually extended its 
breeding-range westward in comparatively modern, that is in post-glacial, 
times. Amongst Arctic birds, the Petchora Pipit (Anthus gustavi) and the 
Arctic Willow-Wren (Phylloscopus borealis) migrate in the same direction, 
probably from similar causes. The Rose-coloured Starlings are very late 
breeders. They seldom arrive at their breeding-quarters before the end 
of May, and do not begin to breed until the middle of June. They 
migrate in enormous flocks. During his last visit to Palestine Canon 
Tristram had the good fortune to cross the line of migration of these 
interesting birds. His party were travelling in a north-easterly direction 
across the plains of Syria, in the valley of the Orontes ; and for three days, 
during the last week in May, flock after flock of Rose-coloured Starlings 
passed them, flying due west. They chattered incessantly as they flew; 
and sometimes the noise of the myriads of voices, as the flock passed over, 
was quite deafening. They fly in dense clouds like Starlings, and Canon 
Tristram describes them as forming into a balloon before alighting. The 
party had just crossed some acres of young locusts, which “ rose at every 
