THE WARBLERS. 
*95 
consisting chiefly of dry grass, with a little moss, a few cob- 
webs, and a scanty lining of horsehair. 
Eggs. — From four to six in number. There is great variation 
in the colours and markings. The most common type is 
olive-brown or dull white tinted with olive-brown, and then 
smudged, as it were, with darker olive all over the egg, and 
clouded with grey round the larger end. This type of egg has 
also some blackish-brown spots or blotches scattered promiscu- 
ously over the surface. A scarcer type has the ground-colour 
white, and the overlying spots and blotches are very faintly 
indicated, the underlying grey markings predominating. A 
very handsome egg is sometimes found, which is salmon-pink, 
streaked or spotted with underlying reddish-brown markings, 
with a spot or streak of blackish-brown scattered here and there. 
Axis, 075-0-85 inch ; diam., 0-55-0 ’6. In the Canaries a 
curious egg is laid by the Blackcap, pale greenish-white, 
with a ring of tiny dark greenish dots round the larger end. 
Mr. Meade- Waldo procured several clutches of this form of egg. 
THE GARDEN-WARBLER. SYLVIA SIMPLEX. 
1 Motacilla sa/uaria , Linn., S. N., i., p. 330 (1766). 
Sv/via simplex , Lath., Gen. Syn. Suppl., i., p. 287 (1787). 
Sylvia horlensi r, Bechst. ; Macg., 11 r. B., ii., p. 345 (1839); 
Seeb., Cat. B. Brit. Mus., v., p. 10 (1881); id. Hist. Br. 
B., p. 400 (1883); B. O. U. ListBr. B., p. 13 (1883); Lil- 
ford, Col. Fig. Br. B., pt. ii. (1886) ; Saunders, Man., p. 49 
(1889). 
Sylvia salicaria , Newt. ed. Yarr., i., p. 414 (1873) ; Dresser, B. 
Eur., ii,, p. 429, pi. 67 (1876). 
Adult Male. — General colour above warm olive-brown, the 
wing-coverts like the back ; quills dark brown, edged with 
olive-brown like the back, the secondaries slightly paler at the 
ends ; tail-feathers brown, with olive-brown margins ; the head 
like the back, with a slight shade of ashy-grey on the sides of 
the neck ; lores and eyelids ashy-whitish ; the ear-coverts pale 
olive-brown, lighter than the back; above the eye a faint streak 
of buff ; throat, breast, and sides of body, ochreous-buff, 
deepening on the flanks and vent ; the centre of the breast, 
O 2 
