316 SYLVIAM. 



Vieillot in the Faune Frangaise, nor by Savi in his Birds 

 of Tuscany, but it is found in various provinces of Spain, 

 and particularly in the valleys of Andalusia, nesting among 

 the shrubs of oleander. Of two examples of this bird, 

 kindly lent me by Mr. Gould for my use in this work, 

 one is ticketed as having been taken in Savoy ; the label 

 on the other, a very fine adult male, from which the 

 figure and description here inserted, were derived, is 

 marked as shot in Tripoli. M. Degland, in his European 

 Ornithology, vol. i. p. 567, says it inhabits Greece and 

 Egypt. M. Malherbe, after having examined skins from 

 Algeria, and others from the vicinity of Caucasus, considers 

 them to belong to this same species. 



Its food is said to be grasshoppers and other insects 

 generally. It is considered a good songster. Though very 

 lively, it is shy in its habits, and whenever it perches on a 

 branch, it moves its tail up and down, like a true Mota- 

 cilla. Its short wings, long and graduated tail-feathers, 

 and the character of its eggs, three of which are figured 

 by Thienemann, Plate 21, fig. 4, of a pale greenish white 

 ground colour, spotted and speckled over with two shades of 

 darker greenish brown, very similar in colour to the eggs 

 of our Great Sedge Warbler, and our Reed Warbler, 

 assist in deciding the place of this species. The name, 

 galactotes, originally given to it by M. Temminck, its 

 first describer, is intended to refer to the light creamy 

 colour of the ear-coverts, and the parts above and below 

 the eye. 



The beak is slightly curved, measuring from point to 

 gape, five-eighths of an inch in length; upper mandible 

 brown above, lateral edges and under mandible pale yel- 

 lowish brown ; irides reddish brown ; over and under the 

 eye, and passing backward over the ear-coverts, creamy 

 white ; from the gape to the eye, a dark streak ; upper 



