108 BIKDS OF NORFOLK. 



faded like the buff-coloured breast of an adult goosander, 

 so soon lost in a preserved specimen. The account of a 

 nest and eggs of this warbler, taken near Downham 

 Market, on the 24th of May, 1847, is noticed in the 

 "Zoologist'* for that year. I have also eggs of this 

 species found in 1859, on the grassy banks of the 

 railway cutting, near a plantation at Ketteringham, and 

 others were taken in Hethel wood, near Norwich, in 

 May, 1864, as noticed in the "Zoologist," p. 9108. 



SALICARIA PHRAGMITIS (Bechstein). 



SEDGE-WAEBLER. 



The Sedge Warbler is not only far more numerous as 

 a species, but less local in its habits, than any other 

 member of this small group, arriving about the first 

 week in April, and leaving again towards the middle of 

 September. Not only does this bird abound on every 

 part of the broads, but the sedges bordering the banks 

 of rivers, the reedy margins of our inland lakes, osier 

 carrs and moist plantations, vdth tangled thickets in 

 low meadows, — ^where the running stream is lost for 

 a space beneath the overhanging brambles, and struggles 

 on through a thick growth of flags and rushes, alike 

 resound with its incessant notes ; in short, wherever a 

 suf&ciency of coarse moist herbage affords food and 

 shelter, the hurried chitty, chitty, cha, cha, chit, chit, 

 of this garrulous warbler may be heard throughout 

 the summer. Except in windy weather, when it 

 keeps low down amongst the reeds and sedges, this 

 species is by no means shy, but flits openly from one 

 green covert to another, often singing as it flies, aud 

 seeming to sing still louder in defiance of any inter- 

 ruption, whilst it perches on and sings from the 



