Variations o/Saxicola monticola, 333 



the ordinary t^'pe, or rather what we believe to be the first 

 breeding-dress^ being that given in Sharpens edition of 

 Layard's work/^ (This description, copied from that given 

 in the monograph of Messrs. Blanford and Dresser in the 

 P. Z. S. 1874, p. 232, is as follows :— 



"Adult male. Shoulders, rump, abdomen, lower breast, 

 upper tail-coverts, and the basal portion of all rectrices, 

 except the central pair, white; a narrow streak from the 

 base of the bill to above the eye grey, or mixed white and 

 black ; remainder of plumage black. The quills and greater 

 coverts are brownish black, and the thigh-coverts the same ; 

 and some black is mixed with the white of the under tail- 

 coverts. On the pair of rectrices next to the central pair 

 the white extends about halfway from the base ; on the 

 other rectrices only the tip is black, but this colour extends 

 on the outermost pair some distance up the outer web.") 



"^As the bird gets older the black of the head changes 

 gradually to grey, followed by that of the back and under- 

 parts, so that an old male has the greater part of the plu- 

 mage grey. We saw several in this strikingly handsome 

 plumage paired with the ordinary white-tailed black female ; 

 the latter does not appear to undergo any such modifications 

 of colouring. It seems clear that the grey colour is not, 

 as stated in the first edition of Layard, a sign of immaturity, 

 for no females were ever observed with any grey at all about 

 them, and, moreover, young birds just out of the nest and 

 barely able to fly, seen on the 26th October 1881, were dull 

 black, without the faintest trace of grey. We suspect that 

 an examination of the series of skins in all stages of plumage 

 which we have placed in Capt. Shelley^s hands will lead to 

 the lumping together of two or three species that have 

 hitherto been regarded as distinct." 



There is no doubt that the question of the proper deter- 

 mination of Saxicola monticola and its closely connected 

 subspecies or allies in South Africa is still a work of the 

 future, and we can do no more in this short essay than con- 

 tribute our mite to the general undertaking. At the present 

 moment there are three high authorities on the genus Saxicola 



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