308 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



Dr. K F. Scharff, of the Dublin Museum of Science and Art, and Mr. 

 W. Higginbotham, of Wexford, for kind assistance. — G. H. Barrett 

 Hamilton (Kilmanock, New Ross, Co. Wexford). 



BIRDS. 



The Icterine Warbler in Holderness.— An adult male example of 

 Hypolais icterina, which I recently examined, was obtained at Easington, 

 in Holderness, on May 28th, aad brought to Mr. Philip Loten, of that place, 

 by a boy, but whether picked up dead, or killed by a stone or with a catapult, 

 is uncertain, as several small birds were brought to Mr. Loten's shop by 

 the village boys about that time. It was skinned and put on one side, 

 under the doubtful impression that it might be only a Wood Wren. It is 

 very possible that the Icterine Warbler occurs more frequently than is 

 generally supposed during migration in spring and autumn on the east coast, 

 passing unrecognised in the crowd of various small migrants then on the 

 move. This Yorkshire specimen of Hypolais icterina, compared with four 

 skins of H. polyglotta obtained near Tangiers by Mr. Hewetson last spring, 

 is altogether a larger bird, and with the wings proportionately longer, 

 reaching to nearly the middle of the tail, and the yellow colour of the under 

 parts is less intense. From the known range of the two, H. icterina is 

 much more likely to occur on migration in Great Britain than its congener, 

 although doubtless this too will be recorded sooner or later as having 

 turned up, and not improbably in the south-western counties or in Ireland. 

 Mr. Gatke says (' Die Vogelwarte Helgoland') that forty or fifty years ago 

 the Icterine Warbler was quite common, but now, with the changed climate 

 in the spring, it has become so rare that only one or two are sometimes 

 seen on exceptionally warm days in May, and on the return journey in 

 August it is rarer still, although occasionally one or another may be found 

 in the potato-plots. It has once nested in Heligoland in 1876, when a pair 

 brought off five young in his neighbour's garden. The Polyglott Warbler 

 has occurred once, on May 23rd, in 1846. In the present example the 

 second primary is a little, but decidedly, longer than the fourth. This is i 

 worthy of notice, as Mr. Seebohm (Brit. Mus. Cat. Birds, v. p. 76) says, 

 11 second primary generally between the fourth and fifth." Prof. Newton 

 also (Yarrell's Brit. Birds, vol. i. p. 362), pointing out the distinguishing 

 points between this and the Polyglott Warbler, says: — "The second primary 

 in the Icterine Warbler is longer than the fifth, and equal, or nearly equal, 

 to the fourth, which is shorter than the third, while in its ally the second 

 primary is equal to the sixth, and the third and fourth are largest." So 

 that it appears the relative proportion of the primaries is hardly to be 

 depended upon as a permanent character in distinguishing this species. 

 The Easington bird, and first Yorkshire example, is now in the possession 

 irf Mr. W. Eagle Clarke, of the Science and Art Museum, Edinburgh, 



