294 ALLEN'S NATURALIST'S LIBRARY. 



coverts creamy-white; quills dusky below, creamy-whitish along 

 the inner web; bill black; feet brownish-black; iris dark brown. 

 Total length, 6-5 inches ; culmen, 0*6 ; wing, 3-8 ; tail, 2*0 ; tar- 

 sus, I "2. 



Adult Female. Similar in colour to the male. Total length, 

 6 inches; wing, 3*75 ; tarsus, 1*15. 



The Isabelline Wheatear may easily be mistaken for the 

 female of the Common Wheatear, but, as Mr. Howard Saun- 

 ders has pointed out, the broader white lining to the quills will 

 always distinguish it. This is a very good character, and 

 another is the greater length of the tarsus in S. isabellina. 

 This is 1-15-1-2 inch in length; whereas S. wnanthe never 

 has a tarsus longer than 1-05 inch. 



Range in Great Britain. This species has only occurred once, 

 a specimen having been obtained by Mr. Thomas Mann, near 

 Allonby in Cumberland, on the nth of November, 1887. The 

 bird was found in a ploughed field, quite alone, and was 

 brought to the Rev. H. A. Macpherson, who showed it to Mr. 

 Howard Saunders, afterwards had it mounted, and then very 

 kindly presented it to the British Museum, where it remains as 

 one of our great treasures in the British saloon. 



Range outside Great Britain. The Isabelline Wheatear is a 

 resident in Palestine and the whole of North-eastern Africa 

 from Egypt to Arabia and Somali-land, and perhaps remains 

 in Masai-land, where it has also bee.i met with. To the east- 

 ward its breeding-range extends to Thibet, S.E. Mongolia, 

 Amoorland, and Northern China, but here it is doubtless only 

 a summer visitor, as it is to Afghanistan, Turkestan, Southern 

 Siberia, and the Lower Volga and Asia Minor. The birds 

 which breed in the latter places doubtless winter in N.E. 

 Africa, but the more eastern birds visit Northern India, passing 

 through Gilgit in spring and autumn. 



Habits. According to Mr. C. G. Danford, this Wheatear 

 frequents barren ground, bushy hillsides, and even fir-woods in 

 Asia Minor. The call-note resembles the syllables zri-zri- 

 zri, but Mr. Danford also says that its notes are very peculiar, 

 the most striking being a cry resembling that of a Sandpiper, 

 which is uttered as the bird descends, after its hovering flight 

 and Lark-like song. 



