SEDGE-WARBLER.— AQUATIC WARBLER. 67 



number of them^ while shooting in the turnips on the north 

 side oi, and in close proximity to, the South Downs. Mr. 

 Jeffery, in his private notes, states that it imitates the song 

 of the Willow- Warbler. 



AQUATIC WARBLER. 



Acrocephalus aqiiaticus. 



The first example of this species which had then been re- 

 cognized in England, and the only one which has yet been 

 recorded as having occurred in this county, was shot by 

 Mr. Pratt, of Brighton, on the 19th of October, 1853, from 

 whom I obtained it. Though I took it at first to be a very 

 bright example of the Sedge Warbler, I was never perfectly 

 satisfied about it, and on showing it to Professor Newton he 

 at once pronounced it to be the above species, and most 

 kindly exhibited it at a meeting of the Zoological Society 

 [vide Proc. Zool. Soc. 1865, p. 310). 



Till Professor Newton saw the example in my collection 

 this species had never been included in any work on British 

 Ornithology. I confess, therefore, that I did not know 

 what it was. Its habits are, doubtless, very similar to those 

 of the preceding species, but, as I have never even seen 

 the bird alive , I can say nothing of them from personal 

 knowledge. 



In tlie ' Transactions of the Norfolk and Norwich 

 Naturalists' Society ' for 1871 and 1872, Mr. J. H. Gurney 

 remarks : " I cannot help thinking that the Aquatic Warbler 

 often occurs in this country. . . . There can be no doubt 

 that the figure in Hunt^s ' British Birds ' was taken from 

 one in all probability obtained in Norfolk, but there is no 

 letterpress to accompany it.^' 



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