SVI.VII.V.K. 



83 



1 ^^'\^ 



SAVrS WARBLER. 



LOCUSTELLA LUSCINIOIDES (Savi). 



As Professor Newton says, in the best account extant of Savi's 

 Warbler (Yarrell's British Birds, 4th Ed., i. p. 389), there can be little 

 doubt that this bird was a regular, though never a very abundant, 

 summer-visitant to England, until the drainage of the fens and meres 

 of the Eastern Counties unfitted large districts for its habitation. 

 The first example ever brought to the notice of naturalists — still at 

 the Norwich Museum — was shot in Norfolk during the month of 

 May, in the early part of this century; but having been submitted to 

 Temminck it was pronounced by him to be a variety of the Reed- 

 Warbler : and subsequently some confusion in his mind was, doubt- 

 less, the cause of his wholly erroneous statement that Cctti's Warbler 

 (a very distinct species, with only ten tail-feathers) had been killed 

 in England. The specific distinctness of Savi's Warbler was first 

 recognized in 1824 by the Italian ornithologist after whom it is 

 named. In after years about six examples of the bird, and one or 

 two of its nests, were taken in Norfolk ; while in Cambridgeshire 

 and Huntingdonshire a larger number of both were obtained in fens 

 which arc, at the present day, with two exceptions, completely drained. 

 The last British specimen was obtained at Surlingham, Norfolk, in 

 June 1856; and none are known to be in existence except those 



\\ 2 



