EXPEDITION TO THE NORTH OF ICELAND. 405 



EocK-PiPiT, Anthiis obscurus. (No Icelandic name.) — I found this 

 bird in all the Fgeroe Islands, and took a nest and young from a 

 stone wall at Klaksvig. In Iceland I only once met with it in 

 Vopnafjord, and then attached no importance to it, and did not 

 attempt to procure the specimen, being unaware that it had never 

 been recorded from Iceland. I do not think that I could have been 

 mistaken in a bird with which I am so thoroughly familiar. 



Meadow-Pipit, A. pratensis. (Pufutitlingur.) — Common in most dis- 

 tricts, and resident. From observations I made I thought this bird 

 ought to be separated from ^. pratensis, and Paber's name, A. islandicus, 

 restored ; as I detected a slight difference in the song, in the structure 

 of the nest, in the plumage of adults and young, but, most important of 

 all, in the fact that the colour of the inside of the mouth, in the nestling, 

 is flesh-white, as compared with the scarlet orange in our bird. After 

 more mature study, however, and the examination of various stages of 

 the young of our bird during the present season of 1901, 1 think it best 

 not to further discuss the question until I have paid another visit to 

 Iceland to satisfy myself that the more important characters are per- 

 manent. I obtained adult male and female, various stages of the 

 young, and nest with five young just hatched. 



Pipit, sp. ?. — I made a special visit to the least known portion 

 of a lovely valley, the sides of which were clothed with dense forests of 

 birch, some of the trees being from ten to fifteen feet high. The 

 undergrowth was as dense as in many English thickets, and to pene- 

 trate this was a matter of considerable difficulty. I was lying con- 

 cealed in this undergrowth, watching Hornemann's Eedpoll, when I 

 heard the vigorous song of a bird which was totally new to me. 

 Cautiously observing, I saw, to my utter astonishment, a small Pipit 

 clinging to an upright slender shoot of birch, precisely as a Whitethroat 

 or Sedge-Warbler would do. When I made my appearance the bird 

 left the twig, and, mounting into the air, continued its song, and flew 

 right across the wide valley, singing the whole time, finally settling in 

 a birch on the opposite side. These movements I followed with my 

 Zaiss binoculars. My attention was shortly afterwards directed by 

 Sigurdur to a little bird skulking amongst the thick scrub, and running 

 along the twigs with as much dexterity as a Grasshopper- Warbler 

 would do. Its movements were so quick, and the scrub so dense, that 

 I could not see what the bird was ; but, bringing it down, I was again 

 amazed to find that it was one of the little Pipits I had just been 

 watching. The markings of the feathers are very similar to those of 

 the Icelandic Meadow-Pipit, but the bird is conspicuously more slender 

 in build, although the wing-measurement is the same in both species. 



