268 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



of red-tiled cottages on one side, and high hedges and timber on 

 the other. Here — and in the same place the following day — an 

 Icterine Warbler (Hypolais icterina) sang to us without any shy- 

 ness. The song is most charmingly varied, and in this case 

 included obvious imitations of the Sedge- and Eeed-Warblers, 

 the Blackcap, and the Greenfinch ; it is, however, rather weak, 

 and does not carry far. " A Nightingale on the other side of the 

 road was audible a hundred yards away, but the Icterine was 

 inaudible until we were within twenty yards or so" (A. H. M.). 

 Why Dresser, or Collett, whom he quotes, should compare the 

 song of this bird to that of the Nightingale, we cannot under- 

 stand. When the two are heard together there is really no com- 

 parison between them as regards volume and power. Neverthe- 

 less, the song of the Icterine is to me extremely sweet and 

 pleasing, and he is a pleasant bird to watch ; a little difficult to 

 catch in the foliage, owing to his dull greenish colouring, but he 

 sits there quite still and serene, only quivering his wings when 

 he moves. The orange-red gape is the only conspicuous point 

 of colour about him. 



Along this road we also heard Tree-Pipits, Garden-Warblers, 

 Blackcaps (singing with a peculiar intonation which I have never 

 heard except once in the Alps), and here and there a Willow- 

 Wren ; but this last was far less common than in England, and 

 the same may be said of the Chiffchaff. My observations for 

 the Migration Committee of the British Ornithologists' Club 

 this spring show clearly that the Willow-Wren is by far the most 

 abundant of our summer migrants at present, but nowhere on 

 the Continent have I found this to hold good. The reason is 

 perhaps not far to seek ; England abounds in exactly the kind of 

 country that this species loves — the country of hedgerow-timber, 

 grassy banks and nooks, woods surrounded by pasture-fields, and 

 so on. It cannot do without trees with plenty of thick foliage, 

 nor without tufty grass for nesting purposes ; but in the great 

 cultivated plains of France these things are not to be had in the 

 same abundance. Whether this is also the reason why the 

 Thrushes are less plentiful than with us, I will not undertake 

 to say, but on both our visits we noted the paucity of Thrushes 

 of all kinds, the Blackbird being the commonest. There was at 

 least one comfort in this, viz. that while listening to interesting 



