CORVUS MONEDULA. 503 



branch, and you have the plain ones laid there the following j'ear. I am quite 

 convinced that the daubing was not done by human agency, as there was not 

 a mark on the bark of the tree anywhere till I went up it with a rope. I should 

 like to know whether the two lots of eggs were laid by the same bird. I so 

 dislike writing for the press that I published nothing about them anywhere." 



So far IVIr. Wharton. For myself I cannot say that I accept his way of 

 explaining the matter, but I cannot offer a better one. The three unwashed 

 eggs were and are completely covered with some earthy substance, so that the 

 natural colour is wholly hidden ; the fourth, which he washed, is an ordinary- 

 looking Daw's egg. The lump of mud or clay is smaller than any of the eggs, 

 and certainly bears marks, which I suppose are those of the bird's bill. The 

 lump is of an irregular shape, rather longer than wide, and might pass at a 

 distance for a small walnut, which the eggs also in their bedaubed condition 

 somewhat resemble. I see no strong family-likeness in the two sets of eggs, 

 and imagine them to be the produce of different mothers. A sketch accom- 

 panying Mr. Wharton's second letter shews that the branch which contained 

 the nest was nearly horizontal, and broken oft' at some distance from the bole 

 of a large tree.] 



[The following belong to the form from Macedonia and other parts of the 

 Turkish dominions, described in July 1846 by the late Colonel Drummond- 

 Hay (Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist, xviii. p. 11) as a distinct species and named by 

 him Corvus collaris.'] 



[§ 2700. Two.— Turkey in Europe, 1869. From Mr. T. E. 

 Buckley, 1870. 



Obtained during Mr. Buckley's hurried visit to Turkey in company with 

 Mr. Elwes, of which they published a series of interesting notes in ' The Ibis ' 

 for 1870. They were strongly of opinion (torn. cit. p. 190) that the " Collared 

 Jackdaw " should be regarded as merely a local variety of Corvus monedula. 

 This is no place to discuss questions of specific qualifications, and I content 

 myself with quoting a footnote which I appended to the remarks of those 

 gentlemen (ut supra) : — " It seems as if Corvus collaris might be looked upon 

 as the intermediate form between C. monedula of Western Europe and the 

 C. dauuriciis of Central Asia." In deference to the opinion of several authori- 

 ties, and especially of Mr. Dresser (B. Eur. iv. p. 527), I keep the last distinct ; 

 but my own inclination is to consider it an extreme form of C. collaris and 

 therefore of C. monedula, — C. neglecius of Eastern Asia, which apparently 

 never assumes the hoary head, and yet frequently interbreeds with C. dauuricus, 

 according to information given to that gentleman by Mr. Swinhoe, being yet 

 another local race.] 



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