THE BRITISH YELLOW WAGTAILS.
153
with accurate detail unusual for ornithologists of that period,
the chief characteristics are noted, namely, the yellow under
parts of the bird, the dull green upper parts becoming yellower
on the crown, and the yellow eye-stripe. They named it
Motacilla flava, supposing it to be the bird imperfectly described
under that name by continental writers.
It was not till 1832 that Gould pointed out that the yellow
wagtail of the continent differs from Ray's bird in having a
blue-grey head and white eye-stripe; he named this blue-headed
bird Motacilla neglecta. For Ray's bird Gould suggested that
the name M. flava, under which it was described by our illus-
trious fellow-countryman, ought, according to the established
rules of nomenclature, to be retained.1 The rules of nomencla-
ture decree, however, that "we cannot go behind Linnitus,2
and Bonaparte (nephew to the great Napoleon) gave to Ray's
wagtail the specific name of Rayi,3 keeping M. flava L. for the
blue-headed bird. At the present time our British yellow wag-
tail is no longer regarded as a distinct species, but as one of the
many well-marked but closely related local races of yellow
wagtail occurring throughout Europe and further east, and its
full designation now is Motacilla flava L. subsp. rayi (Bon.)
Hartert.
Meanwhile, it was discovered that the blue-headed yellow
wagtail, M. flava L. flava, not unfrequently visits Britain. The
first two British specimens were seen in Essex by Henry Double-
day in 1834, near Walton-on-Naze, and since then this form has
been noted in many parts of England, in Wales and in Scotland,
and it has bred in at least six English counties, including Essex.
Besides this, records have also been obtained of birds belong-
ing to four other races of M. flava as occasionally visiting the
British Isles; namely, Sykes' wagtail, the grey-headed, the black-
headed, and the ashy-headed wagtails. Sykes' wagtail, M. flava
L. subsp. beema Sykes is a west Siberian race, having the crown
and ear-coverts paler grey than in M. flava flava ; only two British
examples have been obtained, one from Fair Isle, north of Scot-
land, the other from Sussex. The grey-headed yellow wagtail,
M. flava L. subsp. Thunbergi Billberg (syn. M. borealis Sunder.),
has a dark grey head, black lores and ear-coverts, no white eye-
1 See Proceedings of the Zoological Society, 1832, p. 129.
2 That is, the year 1758, the date of publication of Linne's Systema Naturae, ed. x.
3 See Bonaparte, Geogr. and Comp. List of Birds, Europe and N. America, p 18, 1838).