THE COAL-TIT. 151 



chnr-ckur-chiir, chilr : they lived long enough to fly, and were becoming quite inter- 

 esting, when suddenly they all died off within two days ; having probably 

 swallowed some wadding from their bed, in their greediness after food dropped 

 upon it. 



Family PARW^E. 



THE COAL-TIT. 



Farm ater, LINN. 



DR. SHARPE has separated the British race of this species under the name 

 of P. britannictis on account of the olive-brown tint of its upper back ; but 

 it would appear that the Continental form also occurs in Great Britain, as well as 

 intermediate grades between the grey and brown-backed forms. As a matter of 

 fact these differences, if they were constant, would be trifling as compared with the 

 far more defined local variations of our Yellow- Ammer, the male Kentish bird in 

 breeding plumage differing from that of some parts of Surrey, almost as much as 

 a Saffron-finch does from a Greenfinch. 



On the Continent the Coal-Tit is generally distributed and resident throughout 

 central and southern Burope, extending northward in summer up to lat. 65. In 

 Great Britain it is generally distributed, though local in Scotland, and not recorded 

 from the Outer Hebrides, Orkneys, or Shetlands. 



The adult male has the head and throat blue-black, with the exception of a 

 white patch on the nape, and a much larger one extending from a little behind 

 the base of the bill below the eye to the neck ; back slaty-grey, more or less 

 suffused with olive-brown ; rump browner ; wings and tail greyish-brown ; median 

 and greater wing-coverts with white tips, forming two bars ; breast white, somewhat 

 sordid and gradually shading into buff-brownish on the belly and flanks ; bill black ; 



