344 Mr. H. Seebohm on the Ornithology of Siberia. 
racter we should at once more than double the number of 
supposed species. 
In the valley of the Yen-e-say' both varieties were equally 
common. I only found the extreme white-winged form 
among the males. 
This Wagtail was the first thin-billed bird to arrive on the 
Arctic circle in any numbers. The first break up of the ice 
on the 1st of June was the signal of its appearance. I found 
it as far north as we went, i. e. lat. 71 
The geographical distribution of this bird is very curious. 
As MiddendorflP did not find it, we may take the watershed 
between the Yen-e-say' and the Lay'-na as its eastern boundary, 
whence it extends westwards as far as the Atlantic on the 
continent of Europe, but only appears accidentally in the 
British Isles. As you ascend the Yen-e-say' from the Arctic 
circle, this bird abounds on the banks of the river until you 
near Yen-e-saisk' (about lat. 59°), when suddenly it disap¬ 
pears, and its place is taken by M. personata. From Yen-e- 
saisk' to Kras-no-yarsk', and westwards until you cross the 
meridian of Calcutta, M. personata abounds, after which, 
across Siberia and Europe, you find no white Wagtail but 
M, alba. 
There appears, however, to be a colony of ilf. alba still 
further to the east. MiddendorflP had a skin sent him from 
Birjussa, about halfway between Yen-e-saisk' and Lake Bai¬ 
kal ; and there is no doubt that it is a common bird in the 
neighbourhood of that lake, as skins collected in that locality 
by I>r. Dybowsky are not rare in collections. From this 
colony these birds migrate in great numbers across Mongolia 
and the extreme west of China, and doubtless find their way 
thence to India. 
Motacilla personata, Gould. 
This is a very well-marked species, differing from M. alba 
in having the black on the breast confluent with the black 
on the neck. Well-marked examples show even more white 
on the wing-coverts than in the most marked M. alba, var. 
dukhunensis, whilst others are similar in this respect to typical 
