78 
British Birds. 
The Isabelline Wheatear is an inhabitant of the desert countries from Mongolia 
to Arabia and Eastern Africa, and has once been obtained in England, near Allonby 
in Cumberland, in November, 1887. The bird is said by Mr. Danford to frequent 
barren grounds, bushy hill-sides and even fir-woods, and to rise into the air and 
sing. The nest is placed in burrows and resembles that of the Common Wheatear, 
the eggs being pale greenish blue with occasionally some faintly indicated spots 
of brown. 
THE 
BLACK-THROATED 
WHEATEAR. 
( Saxicola stapazina.) 
THE DESERT- 
WHEATEAR. 
(Saxicola dcserti.) 
This Chat, which is an inhabitant of Algeria, Spain, and 
the South of France, has once occurred near Bury, in Lan- 
cashire, in May, 1875. It is sandy-rufous in colour, with a 
white rump, black wings and black under wing-coverts. 
The latter character will distinguish the female of the Black- 
throated Wheatear from the hen of Saxicola anantlie. The habits of the species 
are like those of the other members of the genus, excepting that it frequents rock)' 
localities and builds its nest in the grass under the shelter of a rock or a stone. 
The eggs are light blue in colour, sprinkled with reddish dots. 
As its name portends, this little Chat comes from the 
Sahara and other desert countries, ranging from North Africa 
to Egypt and Palestine, and thence to Central Asia. It has 
been noticed three times in Heligoland and twice in Great 
Britain, viz. : — near Alloa in Scotland, in November, 1880 ; and again near 
Holderness on the 17th of October, 1885. It is a small species, of a bright 
sandy rufous colour, with the lower rump and upper tail-coverts white, and 
the wings black, showing a large white patch formed of the inner median 
and greater coverts ; the tail is black, 
with the concealed basal third white ; 
the head is sandy rufous like the 
back, but the sides of the face and 
throat are black, and there is a 
distinct white eyebrow ; the under 
surface of the body is sandy rufous, 
but the abdomen and centre of the 
breast are whiter; the under wing- 
coverts are white and the axillaries are 
black tipped with white. The female 
has no black on the face or throat, 
and the under wing-coverts and 
axillaries are white, with dusky bases. 
It can be told from the hens of the 
other Wheatears by the less extent of 
The Desert-Wheatear. white on the tail, this being confined 
