BIRDS OF ETHIOPIA AND KENYA COLONY 235 



tail slightly longer, the scapulars, mantle, and lower rump consid- 

 erably darker ; the gray of the head extending down to the mantle 

 instead of being replaced by brown on the nape as in capensis; the 

 black bands on the rump darker and heavier ; and the rufous on the 

 outer web of the outermost primary less extensive. 



Oberholser^^ separated the birds from the region north of the 

 Zambezi Kiver on the basis of paler, clearer, more grayish colora- 

 tion, and called the northern race anonyma. Subsequent students 

 of East African birds have practically all agreed that anonyma is 

 not a tenable form as the characters do not hold. For the purposes 

 of the present stud}^ I have assembled and examined 88 specimens of 

 this dove, of which 25 are of the Madagascan form aliena and the 

 remaining 63 are from the mainland of Africa. No constant geo- 

 graphic differences are to be found in the latter group. (The series 

 contain birds from South Africa, Mozambique, Tanganyika Terri- 

 tory, Kenya Colony, Uganda, Sudan, British Somaliland, Ethiopia, 

 and "West Africa.") 



The young in first plumage are alike in both sexes and lack the 

 black throat patch. The forehead is whitish, the feathers of the 

 crown are broadly tipped with orange rufous, subterminally edged 

 with fuscous brown ; upper parts dull ashy brown coarsely blotched 

 with white and pale buff, most of the feathers crossed by narrowly 

 exposed black bars, succeeded by buff, and tipped with white, the 

 middle and greater upper wing coverts showing the most white on 

 their tips; secondaries tipped with buff or reddish buff with some 

 white on the edges ; primaries tipped with reddish buff and narrowly 

 edged with white; central rectrices pale grayish drab, obscurely 

 banded across with darker, becoming blackish apically ; under parts 

 white except the breast, under tail coverts, and under wing coverts ; 

 the breast pale ashy brown banded narrowly with fuscous and 

 broadly edged with pale buff and whitish; under tail coverts black- 

 ish, tipped with buff ; under wing coverts rufous, the axillars black. 

 The adults of both sexes lack the pale blotches on the wings and inter- 

 scapulars, the males being more grayish and the females more drab 

 color above. 



The postjuvenal molt begins with the forehead, chin, throat, and 

 breast. A young male from Lekiundu River, Kenya Colony, 

 August 5, is beginning to acquire the black throat patch of the 

 adult plumage and also has a few black feathers on the forehead. 

 The rest of the body shows no sign of molt. This molt is still im- 

 perfectly understood. The available material gives no indication 

 as to whether or not the remiges and rectrices are affected. That 

 there is something peculiar about the molts of this bird seems to be 



"Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., vol. 28, 1905, p. 843. 



