temminck's stint. 401 



stake, or the gable end of a cottage, and wlietlier hovering or 

 standing on its perch, it utters a constant trilling note, of 

 which I can best give an idea by sajdng that it brought to 

 my recollection the grasshopper warbler, though the re- 

 semblance is perhaps slight. 



" When its eggs are very near, it sometimes runs about 

 one's feet, and though it cannot but be anxious, it seems as 

 busy as ever, picking gnats and other insects off the grass. 

 One nest which I found was a short stone's-throw from a 

 cottage where children were playing about in all directions ; 

 another was only a pace or two from a spring from which 

 women drew water every day, and passers-by often stopped 

 to drink. The nest is very simple ; a few short bits of hay 

 in a little saucer-shaped hollow, placed amongst thin grass 

 or sedge, generally not far from the water's edge, but some- 

 times in the middle of a meadow. The eggs in 1854 were 

 laid about Midsummer day." 



The eggs are four in number, pyriform, of a pale stone- 

 colour, sometimes with a greenish tint, blotched with 

 brownish-red and dark brown ; their average measurements 

 are I'l by '8 in. Mr. Collett says that he never found the 

 females near the nest or young, and the brooding birds shot 

 were all males with large incubation spots. Although the 

 nests are in somewhat dry places, the young betake themselves 

 to wetter localities as soon as they are out of the egg. From 

 the stomachs of those he shot, Mr. Collett took insects 

 common on the sea-shore, larvfe of Staijhylinidce, and frag- 

 ments of quartz. The note is a sharp tirr. 



An adult bird, killed at a pond-side in Essex, in the month 

 of May, and lent to the Author by the late Mr. Henry Double- 

 day, had the beak dull black; the irides dark brown; feathers 

 of the head and neck pale brown, speckled with dark brown ; 

 feathers of the scapulars and back, some ash-brown, others 

 black with rufous margins ; wing-coverts nearly uniform ash- 

 brown ; primaries dusky-brown, the shaft of the first quill- 

 feather whiter tban those of the others ; secondaries dusky, 

 but tipped with white ; tertials uniform dusky-brown ; tail- 

 coverts dusky-brown, those nearest the tail-feathers almost 



VOL. III. 3 F 



