393 BRITISH BIRDS. 



leafy stalks of plants. Inside it is built of finer grasses, and lined sparingly 

 ■with thistle-down or the flower of the cotton-grass. Little or no attempt 

 seems to be made to conceal it. It is generally placed on the branch of a 

 tree not more than a few feet from the ground, and sometimes near the 

 top of a bush. Four or five was the usual number of eggs. Some of the 

 nests contained eggs very similar in colour to average examples of those of 

 the Orphean Warbler, but much larger. Dr. Kriiper considered these eggs 

 to be those of the Cuckoo. The latter bird was common enough ; and 

 occasionally we got nests of the Orphean Warbler with Cuckooes eggs in 

 them of the ordinary type. Similar large eggs of the Orphean Warbler 

 occur also in Spain, and are by many ornithologists considered to be 

 eggs of the Cuckoo; but this matter requires further investigation. 



The ground-colour of the eggs of the Orphean Warbler is white, some- 

 times faintly tinted with grey and sometimes tinted with brown. The 

 spots are almost always much more developed at the large end than at 

 the small end, and are sometimes very small, but generally vary in size 

 from dust-shot to No. 4 shot, in rare instances even larger, two or three 

 being confluent and forming irregular blotches. The colour of the over- 

 lying spots varies from olive-brown to nearly black, whilst the underlying 

 spots naturally take the tint of the ground-colour of the egg, and vary 

 from pale grey to buff. They vary in length from '85 to '75 inch, and in 

 breadth from -63 to '56 inch. 



In the adult male in spring plumage of the Orphean Warbler the general 

 colour of the upper parts is dull slate- grey, shading into pale brown on 

 the margins of the innermost secondaries ; the head to below the eyes is 

 brownish black in western examples, and deep black in those from the 

 east ; the outside tail-feather on each side is white on the outside web at 

 the apex, and for some distance on the inside web near the shaft ; and the 

 next two feathers on each side have wedge-shaped white spots at the apex. 

 The underparts are white, shading into pale greyish brown on the sides 

 of the breast, flanks, thighs, axillaries, under wing-coverts, and the centres 

 of the under tail-coverts. In the extreme western portion of its range 

 this pale greyish brown of the underparts becomes a pale bufiish brown. 

 Bill dark brown, lower mandible pale at the base. Legs, feet, and claws 

 bluish grey ; irides pale yellow. In the female the head is only slightly 

 darker and browner than the back. It is not known that any change 

 takes place in the colour of the plumage consequent on the autumn moult. 

 Birds of the year scarcely differ from the adult, except that both sexes 

 appear in the plumage of the female. The plumage of the males after 

 their first spring moult is intermediate between that of the adult male 

 and female. 



The Orphean Warbler, especially the adult males, but also more or less 

 the females and males of the year, may be distinguished from the Blackcap 



