GREAT TIT. 329 



bluish black, broadly tipped with white, forming a conspi- 

 cuous bar across the wings ; quill-feathers bluish black, edged 

 with bluish white, which is broadest on the tertials ; tail- 

 feathers bluish black, darkest on the inner web ; the outer 

 tail-feather on each side dull white on the outer web, and on 

 part of the inner web towards the end of the feather ; the 

 chin and throat black, and united to the black colour on 

 the sides of the nape, encircling the white ear-coverts and 

 cheeks ; breasts, sides, and flanks, dull sulphur-yellow ; from 

 the chest to the vent a black stripe passes along the mesial 

 line ; under wing-coverts dull greyish white ; under surface of 

 the wing and tail-feathers lead grey; under tail-coverts white; 

 legs, toes, and claws, lead colour. 



The whole length of this species rather less than six inches. 

 From the carpal joint to the end of the longest quill-feather, 

 two inches and seven-eighths : the first quill-feather very 

 short ; the second not so long as the third ; the fourth a little 

 longer than the fifth, and the longest in the wing. 



The female does not difl^er much from the male ; the 

 plumage, however, is not so brilliant in colour, and the black 

 line down the breast and belly is not so broad as in the 

 male, nor does it extend so far towards the vent. 



Mr. Lewin, in his British Birds, has given a figure of the 

 Great Tit, taken from a specimen killed at Feversham, in 

 which the two mandibles of the beak crossed each other, the 

 points diverging laterally in opposite directions. This is an 

 accidental malformation which occasionally happens to other 

 species. I have seen it in the Crow and in the Rook. 



