1050 WOOD-PIE—WREN 
WOOD-PIE, WOOD-SPEIGHT and WOODWALL (see Woop- 
PECKER, page 1045); WOOD-PIGEON (see Ring-Dove, page 162). 
WOOD-SW ALLOW, the name in Australia for birds of the genus - 
Artamus, the systematic position and true affinities of which must be 
regarded as undetermined. Some writers place it in a Family of its 
own, Artamidx, others refer it as a subfamily Artamine to Laniudx 
(SHRIKE), while again some see in it a relationship to the ORIOLES, 
and others to the STARLINGS. The species of Artamus, and 17 are 
recognized by Dr. Sharpe (Cat. B. Br. xvii. pp. 2-21), range from 
India through most of the intervening countries and islands to 
Australia, and have many of the habits and to some extent the 
appearance of SWALLOWS (not that there seems to be any afiinity 
between the groups), passing much of their time on the wing, and 
taking insects as they fly. Two species, 4. fuscus and A. leucorhynchus 
or /eucogaster occur in India, the former reaching to the Philippines 
and Hainan, the latter from the Andamans to Queensland, and eight 
others are found in Australia, while one is peculiar to the Fijis. 
They are plain-looking birds, mostly of a slate-colour with more or 
less white beneath. Some forms from Madagascar, as Artamia, 
Oriolia and others, as well as the curious Pseudochelidon from 
Western Africa, have been referred to the group, but it may be 
questioned whether they have anything to do with it. By Anglo- 
Indian ornithologists these birds are generally called Swallow- 
Shrikes. 
WRANNOCK, WRANNY, Orcadian and Cornish, for the 
WREN (A.-S. Vrenna and Wrenne, Icel. Rindill), the inquisitive 
and familiar little brown bird—with its short tail, cocked on high— 
that braves the winter of the British Islands and even that of the 
European continent, and, except in the hardest of frosts, will daily 
sing its spirit-stirring strain.1 It is the Moiacilla or Sylvia troglo- 
tongue. For a long while the subject was not pursued by any other investigator, 
but lately an excellent though too brief treatise on the subject by Mr. Lucas has 
been printed by the Agricultural Department of the Government of the United 
States, together with a valuable preliminary Report by Mr. Beal on the food of 
Woodpeckers (Washington: 1895), the result of whose investigations is much 
against the popular view of the alleged mischief done by these birds. It may be 
mentioned that some limited researches on the pterylosis, conducted by Kessler 
(Bull. Soc. Nat. Muscou, xvi. p. 285), in addition to those of Nitzsch, indicate 
that as being also a promising line of enquiry, though one that has scarcely been 
attempted by other workers. 
1 The interest taken in this bird throughout all European countries is scarcely 
exceeded by that taken in any other, and, though in Britain comparatively few 
vernacular names have been applied to it, two of them—‘‘Jenny” or “‘ Kitty- 
Wren”’—are terms of endearment. M. Rolland records no fewer than 139 
local names for it in France ; and Italy, Germany and other lands are only less 
prolific. Many of these carry on the old belief that the Wren was the King 
ale lily Nii: 
