12 BOOTED REED WARBLER. 



There lias been much written about this little bird, whose history 

 appears to be as follows. — Pallas, in his "Zoography of Asiatic Russia," 

 describes a small Reed Warbler, under the designation of Motacilla 

 salicaria; the Warblers in those days being mixed up with the Wag- 

 tails. In the history of Eversmann's travels to Bucharest, Lichtenstein, 

 the German naturalist, has noticed a bird, now in the Berlin Museum, 

 labelled "Sylvia caligata, Siberia, Eversmann," in the following words: 

 — "A new species, and distinct from all our European Reed Warblers, 

 which Pallas, under the mistaken name of Motacilla salicaria, very 

 fully and correctly described." 



It resembles Sylvia arundinacea, Latham, in its youthful plumage, 

 but it may be distinguished as follows: — "The length from the tip of 

 the beak to the rump is only two inches and five lines; the tail is 

 about two inches one line; the beak is much smaller, only five lines 

 and a half long. The tarsus is nine lines; the superciliary streak 

 not clearly developed, and it is booted to the root of the toes with 

 scales. The construction of the wing is also different: the second 

 primary is of the same length as the sixth, and the third, fourth, and 

 fifth are the longest, whilst in arundinacea the fifth is shorter than 

 the second; also the fourth, fifth, and sixth are contracted in the 

 outer web. The legs are of a bright colour, and the first year's 

 plumage of arundinacea is much paler." 



Keyserling and Blasius also describe the Berlin specimen minutely, 

 and consider it synonymous with Pallas's Motacilla salicaria, which 

 view is also taken by Schlegel in an elaborate analysis in his "Revue 

 Critique." Lastly, Count Miihle, after careful examination of the 

 specimen in. the Berlin Museum, identifies it with a specimen he had 

 killed in Greece. Eversmann, having in 1842-3 published an addenda 

 to Pallas's "Zoography," described the bird which he had discovered 

 as Sylvia scita. Thus it is quite certain that the latter bird, captured 

 in Greece, and described and figured in his work, is identical with 

 the S. scita of Eversmann, thus establishing clearly its title to the 

 distinction of an European species. 



In the "Ibis" for 1867, p. 24, the late Mr. Blyth writes of the 

 Indian Phyllopneuste rama: — "I have compared Indian with Siberian 

 specimens marked S. scita in Mr. Gould's collection, and consider 

 them identical, the latter being in summer aspect of plumage, with 

 abraided feathers that show greyer and much less olivaceous (as indeed 

 I have seen in some Indian examples,) agreeing with Dr. Bree's 

 figure of S. elaica. The range of the latter extends to Egypt and 

 Algeria. I have never obtained P. rama in the immediate neigh- 



