532 PRATINCOLE. 



the bird is chiefly a migrant, though individuals may remain on the 

 west coast of Italy, where the " Pernice di mare " is well known 

 on passage. It continues its course to the Camargue in the south 

 of France, where it finds suitable breeding-ground, except in dry 

 seasons ; while a few ascend the valley of the Rhone to Savoy 

 and Lake Leman, and spread out over France as far west as the 

 mouth of the Somme. In Holland an example was obtained on 

 July 24th 1892, but the mountains of Central Europe form a barrier 

 which the Pratincole rarely crosses ; and, though found in Austro- 

 Hungary, it is very rare in Poland. In Southern Russia and on the 

 eastern side of the Black Sea the representative form is G. melan- 

 optera, which has black — instead of chestnut — under wing-coverts 

 and axillaries, with no white alar bar. Both of these forms (as well 

 as one that is intermediate) are found in Asia (especially on salt- 

 plains) as far east as the Tian-Shan range ; and both occur in South 

 Africa down to Natal in the cold season. There are several other 

 members of the family in the Ethiopian, Indian and East Australian 

 regions, but none are known in the New World. 



Early in May the eggs, 2-3 in number, are laid, with their axes 

 parallel, on the sun-dried mud which has been covered with water 

 during the rains of winter ; the shell is thin, the form very oval, the 

 ground-colour buff or grey, marbled and zoned with black or 

 purplish-brown spots: measurements i"i5 by '9 in. The note, 

 when the breeding-place is invaded, is a shrill kia, kia, kia-ia ; the 

 birds swooping close to the intruder's head, and also cowering over 

 the soil sideways or with extended wings, though this proceeding 

 does not necessarily indicate the proximity of their eggs or young. 

 The flight is very Tern-like, but when on the ground the bird runs 

 with great rapidity. The food — often taken on the wing — consists 

 of insects, especially beetles, grasshoppers and locusts. 



The adult has the upper parts clove-brown ; tips of secondaries, 

 tail-coverts, and bases of the tail-feathers white ; throat buff, 

 enclosed by a narrow black bridle; breast brownish-buft'; belly 

 white; axillaries ruddy-chestnut. Length io'5 ; wing 7*5 in. The 

 sexes are alike in plumage. In the young bird the upper parts are 

 much mottled and barred with black and grey, and the breast is 

 profusely striped with dark brown. The nestlings are clove-brown 

 with slight mottlings on the upper parts, and white below ; they can 

 run, like Plovers, on emerging from the shell. 



