who states that one was shot there October 5tli, 1846, and
a second seen by himself and Colonel Drummond-Hay, in
March, 1850.
The Wheatear is abundant on the European Continent,
due regard being had to the kind of locality it affects, even
to the neighbourhood of the North Cape, and, according to
Pallas, it extends over the whole of Siberia, being most frequent
about the Jenesei and beyond Lake Baikal, but according
to more recent Russian authorities, not going much
further eastward, though Prof. Sundevall states that it
reaches Kamtchatka. Pere David says that it breeds in the
central mountains of extreme Ordo, north-west of Pekin.
I t occurs not unfrequently in the upper provinces of India,
Jerdon having obtained it at Mhow, and Beavan at Umballa
and Morar. It is said to be the most abundant of its class
in all the plains of Persia. Mr. Abbott sent specimens
from Armenia, and though, according to Dr. Kriiper, it
breeds in Asia Minor, in Palestine it seems to he only a bird
of passage*. Mr. Tyrwhitt Drake obtained it in the peninsula
of Sinai, and it is a regular winter-visitant to Arabia
and North-eastern Africa, ascending the Nile valley, at least
as far as Khartoum, where Dr. A. E. Brehm found it.
Chambers-Hodgetts saw it in Tripoli. I t is said to breed in
-Algeria, and it occurs on the west coast of Africa as far
southward as Senegal and the Gambia. On the Canaries,
according to Dr. Bolle, it occurs numerously in some winters,
and Mr. Gfodman found it breeding in the western group of
the Azores, where he believes it has only lately established
itself.
The occurrence of this species in eastern North America
as a probable straggler from Greenland has already been
mentioned, but singularly enough, in the extreme northwestern
part of that continent, the territory of Alaska,
Wheatears would seem to be regular summer-visitants, and
* Syrian specimens have remaikably large bills, and have been separated as
a distinct species, S. rostrata, Hempr. & Ehrenb. : but its validity is generally
doubted.
probably breed there*. The route by which these birds
reach that country is at present unknown, as is also their
winter retreat. It is enough to say that the species is unknown
in British Columbia or any other part of "Western
America, and has never been recorded from Japan or the
coast of China.
The adult male in the breeding season has the bill black ;
the irides dark brown : the lores, a small line under the eyes
and the ear-coverts, black, bounded above by a white line
running from the bill over the eyes to the back of the h ead ;
the top of the head, neck, back and scapulars, of a fine light
grey; wing-coverts and quills almost black, some of the
feathers tipped or edged witlT buff; upper tail-coverts white,
the two middle tail-feathers, with the proximal third white ;
the distal two-thirds black, the others with the proximal
two-thirds white, the distal third black; all the lower surface
of the body buffy-white, deepest on the throat and sides
of the neck; axillaries and lower wing-coverts black, broadly
bordered with white : legs, toes and claws, black.
In the adult female, during the breeding season, the lores
are blackish, and the ear-coverts brown, the top of the head,
neck and back are hair-brown, and the wing-coverts and
quills dark brown; the rest being much as in the male.
The young, in their first plumage, are of a light greyish-
brown above, the upper tail-coverts being white, though
tipped with brown, and beneath of a pale greyish-buff
clouded with brown. The marks on the sides of the head
are indistinct, and the quills and upper wing-coverts less
pure than in the adult.
Immediately after the breeding season, and before the
birds leave this country, the annual moult takes place,
the distinction of age and sex then being much less marked :
the upper parts of the head and body are of a rich russet-
* Vigors long ago described the Wheatear of North-west America as a distinct
species, under the name of S. cenanthoides, but nearly all ornithologists now
agree in refusing to admit it as such ; the differences between it and our ordinary
bird being not greater than those observable in examples obtained in 01*
much nearer to Europe.
' VOL. I . Z Z
i. 1IJ.