2142 Birds. 



if once mixed with them. On the other hand, Mr. Hewitson, who deservedly ranks 

 high as an oologist, gives a very different figure of this egg : his is in appearance 

 more like the egg of the blackbird or fieldfare : still he does not give it apparently 

 without some slight hesitation, consequent upon his not having succeeded in rinding 

 the egg himself during his tour in Norway ; but his figure is taken from specimens to 

 be found in standard collections in this country, one of which is Mr. Yarrell's. But 

 Mr. Yarrell, in his article on the redwing, does not describe the eggs from his own 

 specimens ; he rests satisfied with giving Nilsson's opinion that they are " blue 

 spotted with black." Some one of your correspondents, who may have been fortunate 

 enough to take the eggs himself, and can therefore have no doubt as to their identity, 

 would perhaps be kind enough to remove all doubt on the subject, and in so doing 

 render a service to more than one naturalist. — S. C. Malan ; Broadwindsor, Dorset, 

 April 18, 1848. 



White Variety of the Blackbird (Turdus merula).— A white variety of the black- 

 bird was shot here last year, and is now in Mr. Robert Watt's possession.— J. B. 

 Ellman; Battel, March, 1848. 



Nesting of the Ring Ouzel (Turdus torquatus) in Warwickshire. — The nest and 

 egg of this bird were brought me from Pinley, close by this city (Coventry), on the 25th 

 of last month, together with the male bird, which was shot on the spot. The female 

 was also shot, from the nest. Mr. Bree informs me that he never met with the bird in 

 this county, and it is not I believe recorded ever to have nested here. The nest was 

 placed among the ivy growing round an elm tree, the smallest of four or five similarly 

 ivied ones standing on the brink of a small pond, and in the midst of a highly culti- 

 vated and thickly wooded district. Its altitude from the root of the tree was about 

 eight feet, and from the top of the bank — whence it could be readily reached — five or 

 six feet. The nest is composed internally of dried grasses and stalks, thickly matted 

 together, with here and there a dry oak leaf; while the interior wall, composed of 

 mud, appears to be more solid than is usual in the blackbird's nest, and this again is 

 thickly lined with grasses and stalks, precisely similar to those of the exterior, and one 

 or two dried leaves of hawthorn. On the whole it resembles very closely the nest of 

 the blackbird. Its dimensions are — 



Diameter 7 inches. 



Do. of interior 3| „ 



Depth 3i „ 



Do. of interior 2 „ 



The measurements of an ordinary blackbird's nest now before me differ slightly from 

 these, this being an inch less in external diameter, half an inch deeper, and rather 

 narrower in the cup. There is also usually moss about the blackbird's nest, not a par- 

 ticle of which is used in the ring ouzel's nest I am speaking of. The egg is of the 

 size of that of the song thrush, of a pale greenish blue, very sparingly freckled with 

 pale purplish and reddish markings, except at the larger end, where the mottlings run 

 together so closely as entirely to conceal the ground colour. At a short distance, the 

 effect is that of an uniform purplish chestnut at the larger end, gradually changing to 

 pale blue towards the middle of the egg, of which colour only the smaller end appears 

 to be, as indeed it is, with the exception of a few very minute specks of pale reddish, 

 which hardly show. Six other eggs of the same bird, in my possession, obtained in 

 the neighbouring county of Leicester, exhibit similar characters, though some are 

 redder, some paler in the markings than this : one in particular is of a very deep and 



