646 



BIRDS OF INDIA. 



853. Chettusia leucura, Light. 



Vanellus, apud Lichtenstein — V. flavipes, Savigny — 

 L'Egypte, Zool. pi. 6, f. 2— Blyth, Cat. 1556. 



The White-tailed Lapwing. 

 Descr. — General colour above brownish-grey, with a reddish 

 purple gloss on the mantle, extending over the tertiaries ; head 

 and neck browner and glossless ; the throat and around the bill 

 white ; breast more ashy, the feathers margined paler ; rest of the 

 under parts, with the tail and its upper coverts white, the belly 

 and flanks conspicuously tinged with dull rosy, or a roseate 

 cream hue ; primaries and their coverts black ; the secondaries 

 and their coverts largely tipped with white, and having a black bar 

 above the white ; rest of the wing-coverts like the back. 



Bill black ; irides brownish red ; legs bright yellow. Length 11 

 inches ; extent 23 ; wing 7 ; tail 2f ; bill at front 1 ; tarsus 2f . 



The White-tailed Lapwing is a rare bird in India. I procured 

 it myself only once, on the margin of the large lake at Bhopal 

 in Central India, in December, where it occurred in small flocks ; 

 my attention was first called to it by its peculiar cry. Blyth 

 procured one specimen from the Calcutta Bazaar ; it was once 

 procured in the Dehra Doon, and no other record of its occurrence 

 in India is noted. It is however stated not to be rare in 

 AlFghanistan, where it is called Chiric. Out of India it is chiefly 

 known as an inhabitant of Northern Africa, and is said to be 

 abundant in marshes near Thebes. At the time that Mr. Tristram 

 published his account of its occurrence there, it was stated by 

 him to be rare in European Museums ; only one bad specimen 

 existing in the British Museum, and none in that of Paris. 



The following species differs from the two previous ones in 

 possessing a small lappet of skin, which led Mr. Blyth to class 

 it in the next genus to which it forms a near link ; were it not 

 for its colours and migratory habits it might perhaps be retained 

 in that group. It has been separated as Vanello-chetusia, Brandt. 



854. Chettusia inornata, T. and Schleg. 



Lobivanellus, apud Temminck and Schlegel, Faun. Jap. — L. 

 cintreus, Blyth, Cat. 1555 — Chajyj^oiw. H. 



