BLUE TIT. 209 



streak is indistinctly denned, being dull light bluish grey: 

 over the eye a dull yellow streak running round the head. 

 Forehead, dull yellow; sides of the head the same; crown, 

 dull light bluish grey; the ring on the neck the same; throat, 

 dull yellow. The streak down the breast also obscure in the 

 young male, and wanting in the female: the breast itself dull 

 yellow, tinged with grey on the sides, and lower down; back, 

 light green, with a grey tinge. Greater wing coverts, greyish 

 blue, tipped with yellow; lesser wing coverts, greyish blue; 

 primaries, greyish blue, edged narrowly with greyish white; 

 secondaries, the same, edged broadly with light green, and 

 tipped with yellowish white; tertiaries, greyish blue. Toes, 

 dull bluish grey; claws, light yellowish brown. 



At the first moult in August the bill is dark horn-colour, 

 edged with white; the sides of the head and the mark round 

 the crown are yellow, mottled with white; the crown greenish, 

 interspersed with the coming blue feathers, and the dark 

 streak through the eye and collar dusky. There is a very 

 great and striking dissimilarity in the sizes of different indi- 

 viduals of this species, so much so as almost to make one 

 fancy that they might prove two species, and not one. 

 Individuals vary also in brightness of colouring; and at the 

 time of moulting, in the autumn, they often become of a 

 curious dull and dingy colour, as if in very ill health. 



A white variety of this bird was observed at Northrepps, 

 in the county of Norfolk, in the year 18-18; and another is 

 recorded by the Revs. Andrew and Henry Matthews, in their 

 'Catalogue of the Birds of Oxfordshire and its neighbourhood,' 

 published in the 'Zoologist,' 'in which all the feathers of the 

 wing were more or less marked with large brown spots.' 



