136 LOCUSTELLA 



throat striped with brown ; under tail-coverts pale brown, with broad 

 white tips ; bill horn-brown, lower mandible yellowish at the base ; legs dull 

 flesh ; iris dark brown. Culmen 0'52, wing 2'9, tail 2'5, tarsus 0*85 inch ; 

 first quill 0'2 shorter than the coverts, second and third nearly equal and 

 longest. The young bird has the upper parts more rusty in tinge, the 

 under parts tinged with ochreous, and the throat is also indistinctly 

 striped. 



Hcib. Eastern Germany, Austria, and Hungary; Russia as 

 far north as Central Finland, and about 60 N. Lat., in the 

 Ural ; wintering in Asia Minor, Palestine, and N. Africa. 



Unlike the Grasshopper- Warbler the River- Warbler is more 

 frequently to be met with in wooded districts than in marshes, 

 and frequents thickets and meadows in the midst of large 

 conifer woods, beech thickets, and pastures dotted with scat- 

 tered bushes. Shy, and secretive it usually seeks safety by 

 dodging about amongst the rank herbage. Its call-note is low 

 and harsh, and its cicada-like song which though usually 

 commenced on the ground is continued from the top of a bush, 

 is like the syllables zi, zi, zi, repeated for some time, and 

 though not unlike that of the Grasshopper- Warbler may be 

 distinguished by a practised ear. Its nest, which is placed on, 

 or nearly on the ground amongst grass and brambles, in the 

 woods, not in marshy places, is constructed of dry grass and 

 leaves, lined with finer grass-bents and rootlets, and the eggs, 

 usually 5 in number, are deposited late in May or in June, 

 and are white minutely spotted with greyish lilac underlying 

 shell-markings, and dark reddish-brown surface-spots or dots, 

 and in size average about 078 by 0*54. 



193. SAVI'S WARBLER. 

 LOCUSTELLA LUSCINIOIDES. 



Locustella luscinio'tdes (Savi), Nuov. Giorn. Letter, vii. p. 341 (1824) ; 

 (Naumann), xiii. p. 475, Taf. 370, figs. 4, 5 ; (Hewitson), i. p. 115, 

 pi. xxxi. fig. 2 ; Gould, B. of E. ii. pi. 104 ; (id.) B. of Gt, Brit, 

 ii. pi. 77 ; Newton, i. p. 389 ; Dresser, ii. p. 627, pi. 93 ; Seebohm, 

 Cat. B. Brit. Mus. v. p. 112 ; Saunders, p. 91 ; (Lilford), iii. p. 46, 

 pi. 23. 



Fauvette des Saulcs, French ; Salciajola, Ital. ; Weidcnrohr- 

 scinger, German ; Nachtegaal-Rietzanger, Dutch ; Kamysclufka- 

 solovjinaja, Russ. ; Brzcczlca, Polish. 



<$ ad. (England). Upper parts wings and tail reddish brown with a 

 faint olive tinge, the head rather darker and rump lighter ; tail with faint 

 obsolete bars ; throat and centre of abdomen white, rest of the under 



