SYLVIAD®. 9] 
The food of the Stonechat consists of flies, grubs, 
caterpillars and other insects, of which it devours 
large quantities. In hard weather it occasionally 
waits on any one who is digging, watching for any- 
thing that may turn up; and one of the writers in 
the ‘ Zoologist’ says that on one occasion he saw a 
Stonechat so intent on its search for food that it 
was caught by a hat being placed over it by the man 
who was digging. 
The Stonechat is always conspicuous, both in 
consequence of the situation which it chooses, and 
of the strong contrast of colour which it presents. 
The male bird has the beak black; irides dark 
brown; head, neck and throat black; on each side 
of the neck, just below the black, is a spot of white ; 
back, scapulars and rump black, each feather edged 
with rufous; wing-coverts the same, except those of 
the tertials, which are white, making a conspicuous 
spot of that colour both on the closed and open 
wing; upper tail-coverts white; all the quills dark 
dusky, almost black, edged with rufous; tail nearly 
black; breast and flanks bright rufous; belly and 
under tail-coverts nearly white; legs, toes and claws 
black. 
The Stonechat is one of those birds which, as 
I have before remarked, make a material change in 
their plumage after the autumnal moult, at which 
time it somewhat reseinbles the female: the feathers 
of the head and neck are at that time so broadly 
