WHITE WAGTAIL. 549 



Mr. Murray Mathew not only considers it a regular spring- 

 visitant to North Devon, but Mr. Brodrick found a pair which 

 had a nest in a wall near Ilfracombe. At Freshwater in the 

 Isle of Wight also the nest is said to have been taken. A good 

 many examples have been observed or obtained in Sussex, 

 where it would seem to be a regular summer- visitant, and in 

 like manner in Kent it is said to appear j^early, while the 

 late Dr. Plomley and Mr. Gordon had no doubt of its breed- 

 ing in that county. Mr. Hewitson also mentions on the 

 authority of a correspondent that a hen bird was caught upon 

 her nest at Whittlesea in Huntingdonshire. Mr. Cordeaux 

 states that it has been met with two or three times during 

 the last ten years on the coast of Lincolnshire towards the 

 end of March. Macgillivray said he had several times found 

 examples in the south of Scotland, and Mr. Gray observed 

 one, which was afterwards shot and examined by him, at 

 Dunbar in the winter of 1847. Saxby also saw a pair at 

 Lerwick in 1854. In Ireland Thompson believed it had 

 been observed by Dr. Ball in June, 1846, and Mr. R. Warren, 

 junior, killed one on the island of Bartra in Killala Bay, 

 25th April, 1851. Many other instances of its occurrence or 

 capture in various parts of the United Kingdom have been 

 recorded, in some of which it is quite possible that the ob- 

 servers have been mistaken, but enough has been said on 

 this point. One remarkable fact however should be stated, 

 which is that the bird does not appear to have been noticed 

 either in Suffolk or Norfolk. 



This Wagtail has a far wider range than the preceding. 

 Prof. Reinhardt says that a specimen was sent from South 

 Greenland in 1849.* It is a common summer-bird in Ice- 

 land and the Faeroes, and is found over the whole of Europe 

 from the North Cape to the shores of the Mediterranean, 

 crossing that sea into Africa, where it has been found, it is 

 said, so far south on the west coast as Senegal and on 

 the east as Zanzibar, but some doubt may be entertained 



* The "Motacilla alba'' said (Ibis, 1860, p. 166) to have been observed at 

 Godhavn during the ever-memorable voyage of 'The Fox' was a Wheatear 

 (Saxicola wnanthe), as the Editor was able to satisfy himself. 



