YELLOW-BROWED WILLOW- WREX. 449 



were in sight. This went on for about half an hour, when we came to the 

 conclusion that the nest must be at the foot of the birch tree, and com- 

 menced a second search. In less than five minutes I found the nest, with 

 six eggs. It was built in a slight tuft of grass, moss, and bilberries, semi- 

 domed, exactly like the nest of our Willow- Warblers. It was composed 

 of dry grass and moss, and lined with reindeer-hair. The eggs are pure 

 white in ground-colour, spotted very thickly at the large end, in the form 

 of an irregular zone, with reddish brown, and more sparingly on the 

 remainder of the surface ; some of the spots are underlying and paler, 

 but not grey, and on one or two of the eggs they are confluent. They 

 measure '6 inch in length and '45 inch in breadth. The markings are 

 well defined, like those on the eggs of the Chiffchaff; but the colour is 

 decidedly more like that of the Willow- Warbler's ; but they approach 

 much more closely the eggs of the Indian Willow- Warbler, P. kmnii, both 

 in colour and size. 



On account of the great interest attaching to the Yellow-browed Willow- 

 Warbler, I append the following detailed description of its several plumages. 

 The adult bird in spring plumage has the general colour of the upper parts 

 olive-green, yellower on the rump and upper tail-coverts; a well-defined 

 narrow greenish-yellow eye-stripe extends from the base of the bill to the 

 nape ; an irregular and very obscure greenish-yellow mesial line extends 

 from the forehead to the nape ; the feathers before the eye and behind the 

 eye to the nape and the crown, and the nape between the mesial line and 

 each eye-stripe, dark olive-green, a few still darker feathers emphasizing the 

 eye-stripe on the nape ; wing-coverts brown, the lesser wing-coverts with 

 broad olive-green margins, the median and greater wing-coverts with 

 broad well-defined greenish-yellow tips, forming two conspicuous bars 

 across each wing ; quills brown, all the secondaries and four or five of the 

 primaries with conspicuous well-defined yellowish-white tips ; outside webs 

 of the quills margined with yellowish green, fading into yellowish white, 

 and becoming broad and conspicuous on the terminal half of the innermost 

 secondaries ; quills emarginated as far as the sixth ; tail-feathers brown, 

 the outside webs edged with yellowish green, and the inside webs with a 

 narrow greyish-white margin. The general colour of the underparts is 

 white, suffused all over with traces of yellowish green ; axillaries yellow ; 

 under wing-coverts and thighs greyish yellow. Bill dark brown, paler at 

 the base of the under mandible ; legs, feet, and claws brown ; irides 

 hazel. 



In summer plumage nearly all the yellow and green with which both the 

 upper and underparts were suffused has been lost by abrasion ; the upper 

 parts have faded into a grey-olive, tracss only of the yellowish green 

 remaining on the ru ; np, upper tail-coverts, and the edges of the wing- and 

 tail-feathers ; all trace of yellow has gone from the eye-stripe and win^- 



VOL. i. 2 G 



