5^ 2 



yellowish tinge, each feather with a dark brown median patch ; rump and upper tail-coverts washed 

 with warm ochraceous ; quills and tail-feathers brown, with light margins ; the inner secondaries blackish 

 brown, edged with buffy -white; sides of the head and neck and hind neck buffy grey with dark 

 striations ; underparts white with a faint buff tinge ; lower throat and flanks striated with brown ; 

 under tail-coverts tinged with buff; bill dark brown, the base of the lower mandible yellowish ; legs 

 light yellowish brown; iris dark brown. Total length about 4*5 inches, culmen 0*4, wing 2'4, tail l - 95, 

 tarsus 08. 



Young (Metlino, S.E. Ural, 30th July). Differs from the adult iu having the entire upper parts washed with 

 warm rufescent ochreous, the margins of the quills and tail-feathers being of the same colour ; chin 

 white ; rest of the underparts warm yellowish buff, fading to buffy white on the centre of the abdomen ; 

 no striations on the underparts, except a faint sign of one or two on the side of the breast. Mr. Meves 

 marks this specimen as being in nestling plumage ; but the tail appears full-grown. 



Obs. There appears to be scarcely any difference between the spring and autumn plumage of this bird, 

 judging at least from specimens I have examined. A specimen in Mr. Saunders's collection, obtained 

 at Malaga on the 11th September, is in immature dress, and resembles the young bird above described, 

 but is paler, and then; are a i'cw striations on the side of the throat. 



The range of the Aquatic Warbler is, comparatively speaking, restricted; for it is not met with 

 in Northern Europe, except as a straggler, being confined to the main continent; and though it 

 certainly ranges as far east as the Ural, I find no record of its occurrence to the east of that 

 chain of mountains. It passes the summer in the northern portions of its range, and migrates 

 southward in the winter, at which season it is said to visit North-east Africa ; but it breeds in the 

 north-western part of that continent. 



It has occurred in Great Britain at least on three occasions, and may possibly have been 

 oftener obtained but not recognized. Professor Newton, in the edition of Yarrell's ' British Birds ' 

 now in the process of being issued, says (i. p. 380) : — " The first example of this bird announced 

 as having occurred in England was found by the editor in the collection of Mr. Borrer, who 

 certified that it was observed, October 19th, 1853, creeping about among the grass and reeds in 

 an old brick-pit a little to the west of Hove, near Brighton, and that, having been shot, he saw 

 it just after it had been skinned by Mr. II. Pratt of that town. The bird had been thought to 

 be an unusually bright-coloured specimen of the Sedge- Warbler ; but its real character being 

 made plain, it was soon after, by Mr. Borrer's kind permission, exhibited, May 8th, 1866, at a 

 meeting of the Zoological Society (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1866, p. 210). In the following year Mr. 

 Halting recorded simultaneously in the 'Zoologist' (s. s. p. 946) and 'The Ibis' (1867, p. 469) 

 the fact that he possessed a second British specimen of the species which had been obtained 

 near Lougborough, in Leicestershire, in the summer of 1864. In February 1871 Mr. J. H. 

 Gurney, junior, detected among the British birds in the Museum at Dover a third example of 

 the Aquatic Warbler, which the curator, Mr. Charles Gordon, stated he himself had shot near 

 that town, though his note of the date has been lost. Mr. Gurney has since pointed out (Trans. 

 Norf. and Norw. Nat. Soc. 1871-72, p. 62) that the bird figured as a Sedge- Warbler in Hunt's 

 ' British Ornithology ' was undoubtedly of the present species, and accordingly that in all likeli- 

 hood the Aquatic Warbler had occurred in Norfolk so long ago as the year 1815; but as no 

 letterpress accompanies the plate, the supposition must always remain uncertain." 



