193
Dinant, Belgium.
1897.
July 18.
  Early morning cloudy, remainder of day clear and warm
with light N. wind.
  Spent the afternoon in the terraced garden behind the ho-
tel watching the birds and trying, with the help of Saunders
Manual to disentangle them. It proved a difficult task, for
the adults are now in worn, faded plumage and there are many
young. The Warblers are especially provoking. The commonest
species is what I take to be Sylvia atricapilla, but of the
dozens which I have had under my glass not one has shown a 
full black cap. It is the same with a bird that I am calling
the Black Redstart. Its bright bay rump and tail are very
conspicuous but all the specimens that I have seen (and it is
numerous enough) have had the throat and breast slaty gray in-
stead of black. Coal-Tits in family parties and Robins feed-
ing their young are very common. Yesterday I saw a 
brood of young Parus major in a plantation of young spruces.
  A small, very slenderly built Warbler wholly of a pale
grayish or slaty brown both above and beneath agrees with
nothing that I can find in Saunders although the bird is com-
mon here. The Spotted Flycatcher is less common than in Eng-
land. Yesterday I saw what I took to be Brown Linnets, four
birds flying about and alighting I afield of grain.
  The Coal Tit has one call consisting of four or five