3 
There is no doubt as to its having occurred on several occasions in Great Britain; but most 
of the recorded occurrences require careful verification, as the Scandinavian form of the Rock- 
Pipit (A. rupestris, Nils.), which in the spring-plumage has the breast washed with pale rosy 
vinous, has been repeatedly mistaken for it. During a recent visit to Brighton I examined 
several so-called Water-Pipits in the possession of Mr. Swaysland and Mr. Booth; and Mr. Dawson 
Rowley has sent his entire series of Pipits to me for examination. Amongst all these I find but 
one true Water-Pipit, all the rest being referable to the Scandinavian Rock-Pipit. I took with 
me specimens of Anthus spinoletta in various stages of plumage, and on showing these to 
Mr. Swaysland he assured me that he had never had an example of this species through his 
hands. Mr. Gould figures in his ‘ Birds of Great Britain’ a Water-Pipit obtained at Worthing 
in 1865, which, judging from the plate, is really the present species; and Mr. Pratt, who sent 
this and another specimen to Mr. Gould, told me that they had the underparts unspotted, and 
the oblique band on the outer tail-feathers pure white, which agrees with A. spinoletta. In 
the background of Mr. Gould’s plate there is, however, a bird figured which to me appears 
undoubtedly to be A. rupestris, and not A. spinoletta. 
In many of the occurrences of the present species recorded in the ‘ Zoologist’ and other 
publications, the particulars given are not sufficient to enable me to decide whether the bird 
referred to is really A. spinoletta; but Professor Newton, who is now preparing his article on 
the Pipits for the new edition of ‘ Yarrell’s British Birds’ which he is editing, will carefully 
collect all available information as to how often the present species has really been met with in 
Great Britain, and I cannot leave the matter in better hands than his. I have lately been 
collecting information respecting the reputed occurrences of Anthus ludovicianus in Great Britain ; 
and, so far as I can at present judge, I am inclined to believe that most if not all the recorded 
occurrences of that species will be found to refer to Anthus rupestris or the present species, and 
not to the true Pennsylvanian Pipit of North America. A curious mistake has occurred in the 
‘Fauna Boreali-Americana’ which has tended not a little to increase the confusion amongst the 
various species of Pipits. ‘The bird described is certainly, so far as I can judge, the American 
species; but the specimen figured is undoubtedly a European Water-Pipit ; and I can only explain 
matters by supposing that the specimen actually obtained on the Saskatchewan got exchanged 
for a bird of the present species after the collection was forwarded to England. Macgillivray 
(Man. Brit. B. i. pp. 169-171) states that he compared the specimen in the Edinburgh Museum, 
marked as having been obtained by Dr. Richardson on the Saskatchewan, with examples of a 
Pipit which he (Macgillivray) identifies with the present species, and that the Saskatchewan bird 
had more red on the breast, which agrees with the plate in the Faun.-Bor. Am., but shows that it 
could scarcely be a Pennsylvanian Pipit, as this latter species has the underparts yellowish buff, 
and not red. At the same time I feel sure that the birds described by Macgillivray as Anthus 
spinoletta were not that species, but the Scandinavian form of the Rock-Pipit, as in his descrip- 
tion, which, as usual, is most careful, he states that the outer tail-feather has the oblique band 
greyish white, whereas in the present species it is always pure white, and forms a distinguishing 
character by which it may, in all plumages, be known from the Rock-Pipit, which latter has the 
band on the outer tail-feathers as described by Macgillivray, greyish white. 
Excepting the autumn-plumaged specimen of the present species in the collection of Mr. G. 
G2 
