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Malta; but, though often seen in the valleys and by roadsides in the neighbourhood of trees, it is not so numerous in the island as M. grisola. Mr. O. Salvin found the Pied Flycatcher not uncommon about Souk Harras in the Eastern Atlas, and Mr. Tyrrwhitt Drake saw it during the spring migration in Tangier and Eastern Morocco. A specimen from the River Gambia is in the collection of Mr. R. B. Sharpe. J. H. Gurney, jun., during a recent tour in Algeria, encountered this amongst other familiar birds. He says ("Ibis," 1871, p. 76): "It was not until April that I saw this species, after which it became common. In the dayats and in the Gardaia, where they most abounded, the proportion of adult males in full summer plumage to young birds and females was as one to five. They looked exceedingly picturesque in the rich foliage of the oases, clinging perhaps to a rough palm stem, though their more usual perch was the upper bough of a bush, whence they would dart off after passing flies." To this I may add that the note frequently repeated is

not unlike that of the Redstart, although softer and more agreeable, and the bird when uttering it often shuffles its wings after the manner of a Hedge Sparrow. Canon Tristram found this bird to be a summer resident in Palestine, and first noticed it in Galilee on April 23rd; but, though remaining to breed, he considered it rather a scarce bird there.

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An allied species, Muscicapa albicollis, is generally distributed over the South of Europe, Palestine, and North Africa, which differs from the Pied Flycatcher in having the nape of the neck white instead of black; in other words, the white of the throat extends entirely round the neck. It is found in Greece, Turkey, Tuscany, Spain, Portugal, and France, less commonly in the north of France, and not in Belgium or Holland. It is singular, considering that the two species occupy the same haunts during a great portion of the year, that the White-necked Flycatcher never accompanies its more sable congener to England; yet, so far as I am

aware, there is no instance of its occurrence here on record.

What is the cause which operates to restrain one species from migrating, when a closely allied bird of similar habits is impelled to take a long and perilous journey? Truly it is a curious question.

Before taking leave of our British flycatchers, it may be observed that a third species, the Red-breasted Flycatcher (Muscicapa parva), a native of South-eastern Europe and Western Asia, has been met with and procured on three separate occasions in Cornwall. One was taken at Constantine, near Falmouth, on Jan. 24, 1863.1 A second was captured at Scilly in October of the same year; and a third was procured also at Scilly on Nov. 5, 1865.3 All the specimens procured were immature.

2

The adult bird has a

breast like a robin, which renders it a particularly attractive species. It is said to be not un

1 "Zoologist," 1863, p. 8444. 2 "Zoologist," 1863, p. 8841.

3 Rodd, "List of the Birds of Cornwall," 2nd ed. p. 11.

common in the Crimea and in Hungary, extending eastward to Western and North-western India, where it is plentiful,' and is found accidentally in Italy, Switzerland, and France. Mr. Howard Saunders has reason to believe that it has been met with in Southern Spain in winter, but Col. Irby is somewhat sceptical on the point.2

In Sir Oswald Mosely's "Natural History of Tutbury" (p. 385), it is reported that a pair of the North American Red-eyed Flycatcher (Muscicapa olivacea) appeared at Chellaston, near Derby, in May, 1859, and one of them was shot. If there was no mistake in the identification of the species, one can only suppose that the birds must have been brought over to this country in a cage, and contrived to effect their

escape.

1 Cf. Hume, "Journ. Asiatic Soc. Bengal," 1870, p. 116, and Blanford, "Ibis," 1870, p. 534.

2 See his "Ornithology of the Straits of Gibraltar," p. 224.

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all countries and in all ages than the Swallows; and the habits of those species which annually visit the British Islands have been so thoroughly investigated and so frequently described, that little originality can be claimed for the remarks which I have now to offer.

There are two points, however, in the natural history of these birds which do not appear to have received from their biographers so much attention as they deserve, viz., the nature of

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