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O/js. Both Saxicola pallida, Riipp., and S. isabellina, Teram., have been by many ornithologists considered 

 to be referable to the female of this species. Dr. Finsch, however, has examined the type specimen of 

 the former, now in the Senckenberg Museum, and pronounces it to be a perfectly good though some- 

 what aberrant species, approaching nearest to <S. albicans, Wahlb., and nothing like S. monacha. We 

 have ourselves carefully compared Temminck's figure and description of S. isabellina with the female of 

 the present species, and are now of opinion that they refer to a perfectly distinct species, probably 

 &. saltator, Menetr. 



This Chat is an inhabitant of North-eastern Africa and Palestine, thence extending into Balu- 

 chistan and Scinde. It has been stated by Major Loche to inhabit Algeria; but subsequent 

 researches proved that the examples found there are referable not to this but to the closely allied 

 Saxicola leucopygia, Brehm ; and we can find no authentic instance of the occurrence of this 

 present species in Western Africa. In Egypt it is, according to Mr. E. Cavendish Taylor, very 

 rare ; he obtained two specimens in the month of January. Captain Shelley writes that " this 

 species appears to be nowhere common, although it ranges throughout Egypt and Nubia, and is 

 a resident, frequenting the desert and rocky districts. I only met with a small colony of these 

 Chats at El Kab, where I obtained a male and female, in full breeding-plumage, on the 26th of 

 Eebruary." Von Heuglin states that it has been obtained in Abyssinia ; and Mr. C. W. Wyatt 

 records it from Sinai, and states that " of the Chats, Saxicola monacha was the only species that 

 was abundant, and was chiefly confined to one part of the marshes and sandhills, where the 

 samphire grew, on the top of which they used to perch. Cock birds were more plentiful than 

 hens." 



Canon Tristram met with it in Palestine, but only at the south end of the Dead Sea, about 

 the salt-mountain of Jebel Usdum, and states that when in full plumage it is the most elegant of 

 the group. To the eastward it occurs hi Baluchistan, where Mr. Blanford obtained a series of 

 specimens, which he has kindly placed at our disposal for examination. Regarding the range 

 of this species there and in India, he writes to us as follows : — " I found it in Baluchistan on 

 sandhills, and in the open desert country near the coast, in the winter. Hume got it, he says, in 

 and immediately at the foot of the stony hills which divide Kelat from Sindh, and in the similar 

 hills that run along the Mckran coast. In the plains of Sindh this species never occurs, being 

 there, curiously enough, replaced by a much smaller, but in many respects similar, species, 

 Saxicola capistrata." 



But little has been recorded respecting the habits of this bird ; and we are indebted to our 

 friend Canon Tristram for the following notes on this head : — " Saxicola (or Dromolma) monacha 

 is very reluctant to have its domestic habits noticed. It is very shy and wary, never trusting to 

 cover ; for it lives on the most desolate salt marl hills and plains ; and in the dreary wastes 

 between Masada (Sebbet) and the Dead Sea, it is the only living thing I ever saw. One or two 

 seem to range over a wide tract, without neighbour or companion. They perch on the edge of 

 some marl-mound, and drop over it as you approach, taking a long, skimming flight, more 

 vigorous than that of many of their congeners. The only note I can remember is a long-drawn 

 call-note, plaintive and monotonous. 



" The nest is placed in a very different position from that of S. philothamna, in a hole under 

 an overhanging ledge of crumbling marl, not far in, and flat and loose. The nest I got contained 



