298 SYLVIA D.E. 



but the bird does not appear to be included in the edition of 

 the British Zoology published in 1776. The first edition of 

 White's Natural History of Selborne, which contained 

 several notices of this bird, was published in 1789. In No- 

 vember 1792, Mr. Thomas Lamb supplied some particulars 

 of this same bird to the Linnean Society, Avhich were pub- 

 lished in the second volume of the Transactions of the So- 

 ciety ; and in 1796 Colonel Montagu, having seen and heard 

 this species in various localities in several western counties, 

 and having obtained also some specimens, nests, and eggs, 

 furnished further particulars to the Linnean Society, which 

 were published in the fourth volume of the Transactions. 

 This bird is now very well known, and is at once distin- 

 guished from the true trochilus, or Willow Warbler, with 

 which it is most likely to be confounded, by the broad streak 

 over the eye and ear-coverts of a bright sulphur-yellow, by 

 the pure green colour of the upper parts of the body, and by 

 the delicate and unsullied white of the belly and under tail- 

 coverts. In addition to these distinctions, which on compar- 

 ing the two birds will be found very obvious, the wing of the 

 Wood Warbler is nearly half an inch longer from the carpal 

 joint to the end of the quill- feathers than that of the Willow 

 Warbler, although the birds themselves differ but little in 

 their respective whole lengths : the wings of the Wood War- 

 bler when closed reaching over three-fourths of the lenoth 

 of the tail, while those of the Willow Warbler, next to be 

 described, reach only to the end of the upper tail-coverts, or 

 less than half way along the tail feathers. The two birds 

 here named, and a third species, the Chiff Chaff, so called 

 from its particular note, are the only British species now 

 mcludcd in the genus Sj/lvia^ as at present restricted. They 

 differ from the Warblers already described in the general 

 colour of their plumage ; in not being fruit eaters ; they al- 

 most invariably build their nests on the ground, and their 

 nests are covered or domed at the top, like that of the 



