320 CORVID/E. 



that, tliongli then very common, it was unknown fifty years 

 before, while Rutty iu 1772 observes : — " It is a foreigner, 

 naturalized here since the latter end of K. James the lid's 

 reign, and is said to have been driven hither by a strong 

 wind." There is however a widely-spread belief in Ireland 

 that the Pie was imported into the country by the English out 

 of spite. At what precise date and under what circumstances 

 it first made its appearance we must remain in doubt, but 

 the bird is now unquestionably abundant enough in many 

 parts, and Capt. Clark-Kennedy informs the Editor that he 

 has counted more than seventy in a single field in Donegal. 



To return to the geographical range of this bird, a matter 

 on which opinions are divided. It is very generally distri- 

 buted throughout the continent of Europe, for, though exam- 

 ples from the south of Spain present some slight variation,* 

 hardly an ornithologist is now so bold as to say that we have 

 two species in this quarter of the globe. From information 

 obtained by Wolley in Lapland, it appears within the last 

 century to have been gradually pushing its way along the 

 coast and into the interior from one fishing- station or settler's 

 house to the next, and it has now reached the vicinity of the 

 North Cape on the one side and far up most of the river basons 

 on the other. In the north-east of Russia it is not known 

 to extend beyond Cholmogory in the Government of Arch- 

 angel. It is found in the larger islands of the Mediter- 

 ranean from Sicily to Cyprus, as well as in Asia Minor, but 

 is nowadays wanting in Syria and Palestine, though given 

 by Russell as occurring about Aleppo in the last century. 

 Ruppell included it as being pretty plentiful in winter in 

 Lower Egypt, where later observers have failed to find it. 

 Further to the eastward the difficulty begins. Under various 

 names Pies from difi'erent parts of Asia have been described 

 as forming at least five distinct species t; but both Mr. 



have no name for it in the ancient Irish language, favours the opinion hekl by 

 our best informed naturalists, that this bird is of recent introduction into this 

 country." The Welsh name seems to be Piof/ea and the Gaelic Piorjhaid. 



* They have the rump piire black and a bare sjiot behind the eye, in these 

 characters resemliling the Pie of North-west Africa, Pita mauritanica ; but that 

 has the postocular patch of a fine 1)1 ue and the wings much shorter. 



f The.se are /-•. leucoptcra from Turkestan and Tibet, P. badriana from 



