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shores, or in the tide-marks of some wreck of humanity on the mountain-sides — long before the 

 first Phoenician galley had entered the Bay of Tunis and treated with the Numidian king, before 

 either Roman, Vandal, or Saracen had disturbed his retreats, Moussier was here, never disturbed 

 by a restless taste for emigration, or an appetite for the slopes of Alps or Apennines. I love to 

 watch him as a gentle and genuine Numidian, the one local and peculiar bird. Mauritania (now 

 the province of Algeria) he avoids. The only time I ever found him beyond the frontier of 

 Constantine was once in the forest of Boghar ; and there he was so rare that, of several local 

 French naturalists, not one could tell me what it was. Towards the east he gradually approaches 

 the shore, not crossing the watershed in Constantine, but at Tunis resorting commonly to the 

 ruins of Utica near the coast, and thence extending his range as far as the oases of Djereed, 

 Nefta, and Souf, while in all the more southern oases of the M'zab and Waregla he abounds. 



" Still I hardly expected him at Weled Zeid ; and not having, up to this time, met with the 

 nest, I kept careful watch, feeling sure, from the actions of the bird, that his mate was not far 

 distant. Perhaps it is owing to her modest and inconspicuous plumage that the female is but 

 rarely observed, so rarely that I am sure we noted at least a dozen males for every hen bird we 

 saw. With her brown back and russet-red breast, she is detected with difficulty in the bushes, 

 and, unlike her consort, rarely exhibits herself on the top of a bush or on the edge of a stone, 

 remaining generally among the roots of the thickets. Though in distribution of plumagfr 

 Moussier's Warbler shows a strong affinity to the Eedstarts, yet, in its habits and manner of 

 perching, it is a true Furze-Chat, and I fully agree with Mr. Salvin's opinion (Ibis, i. p. 307) 

 that it is more of a Chat than a Redstart. 



"After a long search I discovered the nest, with a single egg, artfully concealed near the 

 base of a small thirza bush. The nest is very warm, rather loosely built, with a slight skeleton 

 of very small twigs, and a thick lining of grass, wool, cow's hair, camel's hair, and many feathers, 

 chiefly Hoopoe's ; within this a very neatly laid lining of fine hair. The nest is not so compact 



as those of the Whin- and Stone-Chats, but very like that of the Redstart It does not 



appear that this bird is anywhere, even partially, a migrant ; nor could I ascertain that in any 

 locality it is more plentiful in one season than in another." Mr. J. H. Gurney, jun., who visited 

 Algeria some years later, writes (Ibis, 1871, p. 81) that he " obtained a fine male of this species 

 in a ploughed field at Miliana, upon an offshoot of the Little Atlas, 700 metres above the sea. 

 It was alone, not far from a path by which ran a small stream of water ; I also shot two females 

 at the foot of the hills, where the soil was sandy. Its occurrence at Miliana was interesting, as 

 Dr. Tristram had considered Boghar to be its extreme northern range in the western part of 

 Algeria. There I also got a specimen, high up in the mountains; but it was not until I arrived 

 at Guelt el Stel that I found the species plentiful. At this place a good many trees grow, and I 

 observed that these birds perched freely on them ; but I have also seen the Stone-Chat on a tree. 

 In the M'zab country I did not see any, strange to say. 



".B. moussieri is a shorter, stouter bird than R. phosnicura ; hence it cannot hop or fly nearly 

 so quickly, except when pursued. I think its flight even slower than a Stone-Chat's; and it 

 seldom flies far without perching on a stone, clod, or small bush, where it moves the body up 

 and down like R. phcenicura. R. moussieri jerks the tail sometimes, but never so rapidly as 

 R. phosnicmrt. When feeding, it digs its bill into the ground very frequently, and looks round 



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