BROWN STARLING. 57 



of Solitary Thrush, with great minuteness, as a rare British bird, greatly 

 resembling- the starling, and as nearly allied to it as to the thrush. Dr. 

 Latham agreed with him that the specimen described, was " a trifling- 

 variety" of the Solitary Thrush. But the synonimes which he gives 

 all refer to the blue thrush, (Turdus cyaneus, Gmelin,) the female of 

 which, as well as that described by Willughby, 1 does not at all accord 

 with Montagu's description. 



So far from giving it as a rare bird, Mr. Knapp, writing in Glocester- 

 shire, says, " the Brown Starling or Solitary Thrush (Turdus solitarius) 

 is not an uncommon bird with us. It breeds in the holes and hollows 

 of old trees, and, hatching early, forms small flocks in our pastures, 

 which are seen before the winter starling, for which bird, by its manners 

 and habits, it is generally mistaken. It will occasionally, in very dry 

 seasons, enter our gardens for food, which the common stares never 

 do; and this year (1826) I had one caught in a trap, unable to resist 

 the tempting plunder of a cherry-tree, in conjunction with half the 

 thrushes of the neighbourhood." He adds, " I know no description 

 that accords so well with our bird as that in Bewick's Supplement, ex- 

 cepting that the legs of those which I have seen are of a red brown 

 colour, the bill black, and the lower mandible margined with white ; 

 but age and sex occasion many changes in tints and shades. This spe- 

 cies possesses none of those beauties of plumage so observable in the 

 common starling ; and all those fine prismatic tintings that play and 

 wander over the feathers of the latter, are wanting in the former. Its 

 whole appearance is like that of a thrush, but it presents even a plainer 

 garb ; its browns are more dusky and weather-beaten, and for the beau- 

 tiful mottled breast of the throstle, it has a dirty white and a dirtier 

 brown. I scarcely know any bird less conspicuous for beauty than the 

 Solitary Thrush : it seems like a bleached, way-worn traveller, even in 

 its youth." 2 



Other naturalists give a very different account of the bird in ques- 

 tion. Selby, speaking of the common starling, (Sturnus vulgaris, Linn.) 

 says, " the young birds, previous to autumn, or the first moult, are of 

 a uniform hair-brown colour, lightest upon the throat or upper parts. In 

 this state it has been described by Montagu and Bewick, as a distinct 

 species, under the name of Solitary Thrush." 3 Dr. Fleming also says 

 of the starling, " young, of a uniform hair brown, constituting the Passer 



1 Ornithology by Ray, page 191. 

 2 Journal of a Naturalist, p. 207. 3 Illustr. p. 93. 



