AQUATIC WAKTILEll. 
8^2 
call is like the rest of the Keecl Warblers’; its love 
song, though loud, is also pleasant, and comes almost 
always from the depth of the reed-heds, and seldom 
from the summit of the stalks: it is, however, propor- 
tionally often heard among trees. It builds its nest in 
the swamj^; the exterior is formed of coarse grass tops, 
intertwined with delicate straws: it is lined inside with 
horse-hair. It is placed between the slender twigs of 
small bushes, and always especially found in isolated 
marshy places intersected with ditches. It lays in the 
beginning of May four or five, rarely six, eggs, grey- 
greenish or grey-yellowish ground, with spots more or 
less strongly marked, darker than the ground colour.” 
Brehm, in Biideker’s “European Eggs,” says of this 
species: — “It breeds in Holland, Greece, Germany, and 
probably in Switzerland and Italy. At the end of 
April we hear its nuptial song in the marshes, among 
the bulrushes, reeds, and bog plants which grow there. 
Its nest may be found the end of May, containing five or 
six eggs, deep under a clump of sedges, in the grass 
behind rubbish, or on the bank of a hedge near water, 
hanging on the stalks of a plant. It is unlike the 
nest of the Sedge Warbler in being smaller, but is 
built of the same materials, namely, small rootlets, 
mixed with strips of reed and straw, under which is 
also some horse-hair. The eggs are smaller, brighter, 
smoother, and more shining than those of S. phragmites, 
and are often marked with hair-streaks. Very often 
the markings are so faint that the egg appears unicolorous. 
Onee we found a nest containing eggs washed with 
carmine. The male sits but little, the female most 
assiduously. Incubation thirteen days.” 
M. Moquin-Tandon has kindly sent me the drawing 
from which the figure of my egg is taken, with the 
