62 



Unexplored Spain 



violet. Strange diptem and winged creatures of many sorts and 

 sizes, from gnat and midge to savage dragon -flies, rustle and 

 drone in one's ear or poise on iridescent wing in the sunlight, 

 and the hateful hiss of the mosquito mingles with the insect- 

 melody. Over each open flower of rock-rose or cistus hovers the 

 humming-bird hawk-moth with, more rarely, one of the larger 

 spliinxes (S. convolvuli), each with long proboscis inserted deep 

 in tender calyx. Not even the butterflies are entirely absent. 

 We have noticed gorgeous species at Christmas time, including 

 clouded yellows, painted lady and red admiral, southern wood- 

 argus, Bath white, Lycaena telicanus, Thais 2^olyxena, Megaera, 

 and many more. On the warm sand at midday bask pretty 



green and spotted 

 lizards,^ apparently 

 asleep, but alert to 

 dart ofi" on slightest 

 alarm, disappearing 

 like a thouolit in 



O 



some crevice of the 

 cistus stems. 



Hard by a winter- 

 wandering hoopoe 

 struts in an open 

 glade, prodding the 

 earth with curved bill and crest laid back like a "claw- 

 hammer"; from a tall cistus -spray the southern grey shrike 

 mumbles his harsh soliloquy, and chattering magpies everywhere 

 surmount the evergreen bush. AVhere the warm sunshine 

 induces untimely ripening of the tamarisk, some brightly 

 coloured birds flicker around pecking at the buds. They appear 

 to be chaflinches, but a glance through the glass identifies 

 them as bramblings — arctic migrants that we have shot here in 

 midwinter with full black heads — in " breeding -plumage" as 

 some call it, though it is merely the result of the wearing-away 

 of the original grey fringe to each feather, thus exposing the 

 glossy violet-black bases. 



Birds, as a broad rule, possess no " breeding-plumage." They 

 only renew their dress once a year, in the autumn, and breed the 



' Tlioie are sand-lizards identical in colour with the sand itself — pale yellow or drab, 

 adorned witli wavy black lines closely resembling the wind waves on tlie sand. 



GREAT GREY SHRIKE {Lanius meritlio/ialis) 



