366 SYLVIAB^. 



THE DARTFORD WARBLER appears to have been first 

 made known as a bird inhabiting this country by Dr. La- 

 tham, from specimens obtained at Bexley Heath, near 

 Dartford, in April, 1773 ; the occurrence of this novelty 

 was soon after communicated to Pennant, who inserted 

 this species in the edition of his British Zoology published 

 in 1776. 



The generic term Melizophilus was applied to this bird 

 by the late Dr. Leach, and first appeared in print in 

 1816 in a small, thin quarto volume, entitled " A Syste- 

 matic Catalogue of the Specimens of the Indigenous Mam- 

 malia and Birds then preserved in the British Museum," 

 and this generic distinction of the Dartford Warbler has 

 been admitted to some extent in the works of other Na- 

 turalists. Since this bird was discovered on Bexley Heath 

 in Kent, it has been found on most of the commons in 

 Kent, Surrey, or Middlesex, which bear old and thick 

 furze. It has been seen in the New Forest, Hampshire. 

 Colonel Montagu found it both in Cornwall and Devon- 

 shire, and has detailed at length, both in the Linnean 

 Transactions and in the Supplement to his Ornithological 

 Dictionary, the habits of this bird, more particularly 

 during the spring and summer, which will be hereafter 

 referred to : but so many examples have occurred during 

 winter, that there is no doubt this little hardy warbler 

 remains in this country the whole year. Montagu shot 

 one from the upper branch of a furze bush at a time when 

 the furze was covered with snow ; and he saw other speci- 

 mens on the same occasion. Mr. Rennie, in his Archi- 

 tecture of Birds, page 233, says, " We observed this bird 

 on Blackheath, suspended over the furze, and singing on 

 the wing like a Whitethroat or a Titlark, as early as the 

 end of February, 1830; whence we concluded that, not- 



