BIRDS OF NORTH AND MIDDLE AMERICA 83 



Rlallus] tenuirostris Ridgway, Man. North Amer. Birds, 1887, 13S. 



Rallus tenuirostris Salvin and Godman, Biol. Centr.-Amer., Aves, iii, 1903, 316, 



part (City of Mexico; Laguna del Rosario). — Cooke, U. S. Dept. Agr. Bull. 



128, 1914, 17, part (geogr. range). 

 Rallus tenuirostris Shaepe, Hand-list, i, 1S99, 93. 

 Rallus longirostris tenuirostris OBEiaioLSEE, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus. Ixsxiv, 1937, 



336 (monogr., crit.). 



RALLUS ELEGANS ELEGANS Andubon 



King Rail 



Adult (sexes alike), dark phase. — Forehead, crown, occiput, and 

 nape deep, rich mummy brown, the feathers of the foreliead and 

 crown with shiny black shafts; scapulars, interscapulars, upper and 

 lower back, rump, upper tail coverts, and rectrices deep fuscous to 

 fuscous-black, the feathers broadly edged with tawny-olive to buck- 

 thorn brown, the edges becoming broader on the more posterior parts, 

 often occupying (between the two margins) more than half the 

 width of the feather on the long scapulars and the feathers of the 

 rump and the upper tail coverts, narrow on the anterior interscapu- 

 lars; upper wing coverts deep hazel to bright russet, some of the 

 outer median and greater coverts with narrow whitish tips and a 

 concealed narrow subterminal whitish band; remiges sepia, the outer 

 web of the outermost primary often slightly paler — Saccardo's umber ; 

 a light stripe from the base of the maxilla over and behind the eye 

 light pinkish cinnamon ; rest of lores, circumocular area, cheeks, and 

 auriculars grayish mummy brown ; lower cheeks and sides of throat 

 cinnamon; chin and middle of upper throat white; lower throat, 

 breast, and upper abdomen cinnamon becoming paler in the mid- 

 ventral part of the upper abdomen, the feathers faintly tipped with 

 white on the upper abdomen, without pale tips on the breast feathers ; 

 middle of abdomen light buff; thighs similar but transversely barred 

 with deep drab to hair brown; flanks sepia barred with white, the 

 feathers tipped with white and crossed by two or three white bars 

 each; vent similar to flanks; under tail coverts white, not buffy, and 

 with the sepia areas reduced making the white bars wider; the outer 

 webs of the lateral ones wholly white; axillars and under wing 

 coverts deep rich sepia tipped and crossed by narrow bars of white; 

 iris light burnt sienna; most of lower mandible and the maxillary 

 tomium dull reddish brown, the extreme base of maxilla (near the 

 gape and below) ochre-yellow; tarsi and toes and claws pale brownish 

 gray. 



Adidt (sexes alike), light phase. — Similar to the dark phase but 

 with forehead, crown, occiput, and nape Front's brown; feathers of 

 upper parts of the body with paler margins — pinkish buff with a 



