76 
NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 
and in the spring on ivy-berries. I dressed one of these birds, 
and found it juicy and well-flavoured. It is remarkable that they 
make but a few days' stay in their spring visit, but rest near a 
fortnight at Michaelmas. These birds, from the observations of 
three springs and two autumns, are most punctual in their re- 
turn, and exhibit a new migration unnoticed by the writers, who 
supposed they never were to be seen in any of the southern 
counties. 
One of my neighbours lately brought me a new salicaria, 
w^hich at first I suspected might have proved your willow-lark,* 
but, on a nicer examination, it answered much better to the de- 
scription of that species w^hich you shot at Revesby, in Lincoln- 
shire. My bird I describe thus : *'It is a size less than the 
grasshopper-lark ; the head, back, and coverts of the wings, of a 
dusky brown, without those dark spots of the grasshopper-lark ; 
over each eye is a milkwhite stroke ; the chin and throat are 
white, and the under parts of a yellowish white ; the rump is 
tawny, and the feathers of the tail sharp-pointed ; the bill is 
dusky and sharp, and the legs are dusky; the hinder claw long 
and crooked." The person that shot it says that it sung so hke 
a reed-sparrow that he took it for one ; and that it sings all 
night : but this account merits further enquiry.f For my part, I 
* For this salicaria see letter August 30, 1/69. 
t The above-mentioned garrulous little bird is the sedge-reedling {salicaria phragmitis) , a 
common summer visitant pretty generally diffused over the country, haunting watery situations, 
the sedgy borders of rivers and ponds, where it subsists entirely on insects, and which it enlivens 
day and night with its peculiar and characteristic chat- 
tering song, consisting of a variety of repeated chirrups, 
many of which closely resemble those of the sparrow 
and other birds, whence the species has been termed by 
some the English mocking-bird. Its various notes, 
however, are all perfectly original, the same being alike 
uttered in every locality, often where the species it is 
described to imitate are never found. The remark of 
Mr. White's informant, that the individual he procured 
« sung like a reed-sparrow,^' is a toistake which a cur- 
sory observer is very apt to fall into, the little songster 
often chattering concealed in the thickest part of a 
bush, while a mono'tonous or silent reed-bunting 
{emberiza schceniculus) , commonly cstUed "reed-sparrow," sitting conspicuously on one of the 
outer twigs, obtains full credit for the music — the more plausibly, from the sparrow-like tone of 
many of the others chirpings. The sedge-reedling is a very lively and cheerful little bird, and 
there is a briskness and a sort of artlessness about its song that renders it, at least for a time, 
extremely pleasing. Sometimes it will mount singing a little way up into the air, and it fre- 
quently chirrups as it flits from bush to bush ; in short, it is a most untiring songster, insomuch 
that it often becomes at length quite an annoyance to some persons who live near the water. 
There is a species closely allied to this in Italy and in many parts of the south of Europe, the 
S. aquatica {trilineata would be better, as more exclusive), which has been known to visit as far 
north as Holland. It is easily distinguishable by having a broad pale streak along the crown of 
the head, similar to that over each eye. The sedge-reedling nidificates in clumps of herbage 
Sedge Reedling. 
