select grassy spots. I have never seen or heard of but one otlier Devonshire specimen ; and that was sent 
from Teignmouth with some Redstarts to Plymouth to be preserved.” Were it necessary, 1 could doubtless 
find other notices of its occurrence in our island ; but sufficient has been said to establish its claim to be 
considered a British Bird. 
Temminck, in his ‘Manuel,’ says '^Habite: sur les Alpes, le long des rochers ; dans la belle saison il ' 
gagne les plus grandes elevations des montagnes, et descend dans les regions moyennes a Tapproche de 
I’hiver; tres-commun sur le Saint-Bernard, dans les environs de I’hospice ; egalement abondant dans 
quelques parties montueuses de I’Allemagne et de la France. 
“ Nournture : petits hannetons et autres insectes ; en hiver uniquement des semences et des plantes 
alpestres. 
“ Propagation : niche dans les fentes des rochers, quelquefois aussi sous les toits des maisons et dans les 
villages situes sur les montagnes ; pond cinq ceufs verdatres.” 
“This bird,” says Bailly “ is common during the breeding-season in all the Maurienne Alps, Mount Cenis. 
and Chamounix ; it is even met with as high as the region of perpetual snow, and also inhabits, but in 
lesser numbers, the rocky portions of the Tarentaise Alps, more especially the vicinity of the glaciers of the 
Alines, and similar situations. It builds in the hollows or crevices of inaccessible rocks, in the mouths 
of the funnels, as they are called, or small cavities formed in the chalky part of the rocks by the 
dripping of water, sometimes on the ground amidst heaps of stones, among the rubbish fallen from the 
neighbouring heights, and occasionally in the cavities of old pines or firs growing on the summits of the 
rocks close to the glaciers, and sometimes under the roofs of chalets. Both sexes assist in the collection of 
the materials for the nest, which is outwardly composed of mosses, dry grasses, and the roots of plants, the 
interior lining being formed of hay and the down of flowering plants ; when complete, it is nearly as large 
as that of the Rock-Thrush, which it much resembles. I have also found nests composed almost entirely 
of the straw of oats, rye, arid wheat — an anomaly which is thus accounted for: those who collect ice in the 
glaciers frequently let fall pieces of the straw in which it is wrapped for transport ; and of these the birds 
immediately avail themselves. About the middle of May the female deposits four or five eggs, of a glossy 
greenish blue without spots, and towards the end of June or the beginning of July makes a second laying 
of three or four, always at a greater elevation than that at which the first were placed.” 
The sexes, like those of the other members of the genus, differ so little in their colour and markings that 
it is impossible to say for certain, from external appearance, which are males and which are females. 
The male has the feathers of the head, neck, and ear-coverts brownish-grey, darkest in the centre ; on the 
throat a large gorget of greyish white, with a small spot of slaty black at the tip of each feather; feathers of 
the back blackisb brown, broadly margined with light reddish brown; rump greyish brown; greater and 
lesser wing-coverts light brown at tbe base, black towards the extremity, and with a spot of white at the tip, 
forming two bands across that part of the wing ; spurious wing light brown, tipped first with a narrow line 
of white, and then with black ; primaries brown, with lighter edges, the remainder of the wing-feathers 
blackish brown, margined on both webs with reddish brown, and slightly tipped with dull white ; iq)per 
surface of the tail-feathers dark brown, tipped with light buff’; chest, reddisli grey ; flank-feathers rufous, 
margined with greyisli ; under tail-coverts dark brown, margined with reddish brown at the base, and tipped 
obliquely on each side with greyish white ; irides hazel ; bill yellow at the base, black at the tip ; legs and 
toes orange-brown, claws black. 
The figiu’es in the accompanying Plate are of the size of life. 
ferrugineum, and the blue one Gentiana verna. 
The red-flowering plant is the Rhododendron 
