EOOBED SHBIKE. 27 



bar at its extremity. In its habits he differs much from other Shrikes, 

 never showing himself as they do on the extremity of a branch, or 

 in an exposed tree, but always concealed in the thickest recesses. 

 'Heard, not seen/ is his motto. I looked in vain for the nest, which 

 was probably in the neighbourhood, as I saw another bird gliding 

 through an adjoining thicket. A few days afterwards I obtained a 

 nest, the only one I ever took, placed in the centre of an arbutus 

 bush, large, and coarsely constructed of twigs, with a thick lining of wool 

 and hair, and containing four eggs. These were slightly larger than 

 those of L. excubifor, of a white ground very thickly covered over 

 the whole surface with brown spots, and a few russet red blotches, 

 somewhat intermediate between the Shrike and the Lark. But for 

 the closeness of the spots and their reddish hue, they might easily 

 pass for the eggs of Certhilauda desertorum in my collection. The 

 Hooded Shrike is not a desert bird, but only a summer visitant to 

 the Tell, retiring however very late, as I have met with birds of the 

 year at the end of October. It seems strictly confined to the forest 

 districts." 



Von Heuglin, in his "Vogel Nord Ost Africas," remarks that this 

 bird "varies in proportions and colouring. Riippell also draws attention 

 to two races always. In specimens received from Kordofan the neck 

 and middle of the back are isabelle colour; the whole of the body 

 underneath almost milk white; the feet a clear brown." This is 

 clearly not the Lanius cucullatus of Temminck, which I am now 

 describing, neither does it answer to the bird described by Vieillot. 

 "The race which inhabits the Abyssinian coast land has the neck 

 and its sides and the middle of the back green brown: breast and 

 belly blue grey; the feet a dark brown." This is the bird which I 

 consider, from its inhabiting Morocco, is the bird found in Spain, 

 but this is clearly the same bird as that described by Vieillot, whose 

 account of the bird I append to this, as the reviewer of my first 

 edition in the "Ibis" implies that I have there described Vieillot's 

 bird, but not that of Temminck. I shall in this edition figure and 

 describe, as the Hooded Shrike found in Europe, a specimen from 

 Morocco. 



Von Heuglin goes on: "The Tschagra is a very common bird in 

 Soudan, in Takah, and the Bischaria region, and extends northwards 

 to 19° N. lat. In Abyssinia it does not perhaps extend higher than 

 the Worna Degu territory (6,000 to 7,000); in the region of the 

 Abiad we met with it westwards even to the boundary of Dar-Festit: 

 on the Nile proper northwards to the province of Besber. It seems 

 to be resident in all other places. In many respects these birds 



