THE TRUE NUTHATCHES. 127 



Adult Male. General colour above clear grey or slaty-blue, 

 ncluding the wings and centre tail-feathers ; quills dusky-brown, 

 xternally slaty-blue, the primaries whitish near the base of the 

 mter web ; tail-feathers, except the centre ones, black, with 



grey tip, the inner web of the three penultimate feathers 

 white at the tip, the outermost tail-feathers with a white sub- 

 erminal band extending obliquely across both inner and outer 

 webs ; over the eye a faint streak of greyish-white ; a black band 

 enclosing the lores and the feathers below the eye, extending 

 n a broad line down the sides of the neck ; cheeks and throat 

 ashy-white ; remainder of under surface of body light fawn- 

 colour or isabelline ; the flanks vinous chestnut ; under tail- 

 coverts white, mottled with chestnut edges to the feathers ; 

 under wing-coverts like the breast, with ashy- white bases, and 

 laving a large patch of black near the edge of the wing ; quill- 

 ining ashy white ; bill slaty blue, the lower mandible paler ; 

 feet pale reddish-brown; iris hazel. Total length, 5-8 inches; 

 culmen, o'8; wing, 3-4; tail, 17; tarsus, 0*8. 



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

 5-4 inches; wing, 3-35. 



Young. Similar to the adults, but with paler and more yel- 

 owish feet, the colours all duller, the black streak on the sides 

 of the head and the chestnut flanks not so strongly marked 

 as in the adults. 



Range in Great Britain. Pretty generally distributed over 

 England, but becoming rarer in the north, scarcely known 

 in Scotland, and altogether absent in Ireland. Mr. Howard 

 Saunders says that the species appears to have decreased in 

 numbers in the northern counties of late years, but in other 

 parts of England it is increasing. It has been obtained only 

 in the south of Scotland, in Berwickshire and Haddington- 

 shire, though there are one or two other records. 



Range outside the British Islands. The distribution of our Nut- 

 hatch on the continent of Europe is somewhat singular and 

 interesting. It is spread over Southern and Central Europe, 

 and extends eastward as far as Asia Minor and Palestine, 

 northward to the Baltic Provinces as far as the peninsula of 

 Jutland. Here its range coalesces with that of the Scandi- 



