82 (iRASSHOPPER-WARHLER. 



is not improbable that it may often be overlooked. In Italy it is 

 said to be rare ; but in the south of Spain I found it fairly abundant 

 in autumn and winter: and in the latter season it appears to visit 

 Morocco and Algeria. Eastward, it can be traced in Europe to 

 Transylvania and to the south-west of Russia ; but beyond the Ural 

 Mountains its place is taken by allied species : — Z. lanceolata in 

 Siberia, and L. siraiiiinea in Turkestan ; there is, however, still 

 niucii to be learnt respecting the eastern limits of our bird. 



The nest may be looked for in clumps of dry fen-grass, the 

 bottoms and sides of thick hedge-rows, rank herbage on hill-sides, or 

 in young plantations. When flushed from her nest the bird flies off" 

 with a very peculiar drooping movement of her outspread tail, and, 

 if not immediately pursued, she will usually not fly far. On her 

 return she will, doubtless, come stealing back again with the 

 mouse-like action so often insisted upon as a characteristic by various 

 writers, but neither Mr. A. H. Evans nor I have noticed this per- ' 

 formance on her leaving the nest. The compact and rather deep 

 structure is principally composed of moss and dry grass, with a finer 

 lining of the latter ; the eggs, 5-7, are pale pinkish-white, freckled 

 and zoned with darker reddish-brown : average measurements 7 by 

 ■54 in. Two broods are sometimes reared in the season ; the first 

 eggs being laid about the third week in May ; while they have 

 been taken fresh in the first week of August. The song, already 

 described, may be heard to advantage on a still summer's evening, 

 or during the two or three hours after dawn ; the bird perching 

 on the topmost spray of a bush or the point of a tall reed to utter 

 it, but taking refuge in the herbage on the smallest alarm, although 

 perhaps only for a moment. The alarm-note is a sharp tic, tic, tac. 

 The food consists of dragon-flies — taken on the wing — and other 

 insects, with their larvae. It appears to migrate in large parties, for 

 Mr. Booth has observed several hundreds at daybreak early in May, 

 all congregated on a small patch of some dozen or twenty acres of 

 mud-banks covered with marsh-samphire and other weeds, near 

 Rye in Sussex, and evidently making their way inland. 



The adult above is greenish-brown, with darker striations down the 

 centre of each feather ; quills and tail brown, with faint bars on the 

 latter ; under parts pale brown, with darker spots on the neck and 

 breast ; under tail-coverts very long, and streaked along the shaft 

 with dark brown ; bill brown ; legs and feet pale yellowish-brown. 

 Length 5-5 in. ; wing to tip of 3rd and longest quill 2-5 in. The 

 sexes are alike in phunage. The young are more suffused with buff 

 on the under parts, and have larger bastard primaries. 



