BLACK REDSTART.

Pheenicura tithys, Jard. and Selby.

Le Bec-fin a rouge queue.

Since the discovery of this species as an occasional visitant, as recorded by us in the ‘‘ Zoological Journal,”
vol. 5. No. 17. p. 102., we have ascertained the fact of several other examples having been killed in different
counties: and here we may mention that a fine specimen was shot at Brighton, another at Bristol, and a male
bird was killed on Teignmouth sands in Devonshire, on the 7th of January 1833, by L. Sulivan, Esq.,
who placed the specimen in our hands. Still the occurrence of the Phenicura tethys in our island must be
considered as a circumstance of extreme rarity, though in some parts of the Continent it is as abundant as
its nearly allied congener the Redstart with us. According to M. Temminck, it is found in the northern
provinces of Europe, especially in rocky situations, a fact borne out by Mr. Sulivan’s observations on the
specimen he killed, which was flitting about the rocks on the Devonshire coast. In Holland and the flat
lands of the Continent it appears to be nearly as rare as in England. In our late journey through Prussia,
we observed it all along the road between Frankfort and Berlin. Its nest, M. Temminck says, is placed in
the clefts of rocks, or in the fissures of towers and other old buildings ; the eggs being six in number, of a
pinky white.

The male and female offer considerable difference in the colouring of their plumage, the former of which
may be thus described :—

The space between the beak and the eye, the cheeks, the throat and breast, deep black, which fades off
into blueish ash on the belly and flanks; the upper parts are more inclined to dark grey ; the forehead
inclining to white; the rump and tail bright red, the middle feathers of the latter being brown ; the greater
coverts of the wings bordered with white ; beak, irides and tarsi blackish brown.

The female has the upper parts of a dull brownish grey ; the lower parts light grey; the coverts and quill-
feathers bordered with grey; the rump and the tail-feathers dull red ; beak, irides and tarsi as in the male.

We have figured an adult male and female of the natural size.