Mr. T. Ayres on the Ornithology of Transvaal. 289 



feed in the open in the evening ; they are generally solitary, 

 and I never found more than two together. 



[The two male specimens of this scarce Goatsucker sent 

 by Mr. Ayres respectively measure in the wing T'Qo and 7'9 

 inches, and the two females 7'9 and 7'Q, Both the males 

 are somewhat darker than the females on the entire upper 

 surface, and much darker than Sir A. Smith's figure"^ of a 

 female obtained by him in Great Namaqna Land ; they are 

 also somewhat darker than the specimen preserved in the 

 British Museum, which was obtained at the river Cunene, 

 and which, judging from the absence of any white patch on 

 the tail, is also a female. One of the males sent by Mr. Ayres 

 shows a large subterminal patch of pure white on both webs 

 of the two outermost pairs of rectrices ; this white patch 

 reaches to the edge of the feather at the tip of the inner web 

 on the pair of rectrices next to the outermost pair ; and on 

 the latter it does so very nearly ; in the other male all these 

 feathers have been cut off (apparently by a shot), except one 

 of the external rectrices, in which the white patch is even 

 more extended than in the first-named specimen, being fully 

 an inch and a half in length. No trace of any white patch 

 is to be found on the tail of either of the female birds. 



In both the males, and in the larger of the two females, 

 there is a white spot on the inner web of the first four pri- 

 maries; in the other female it is present in the first three 

 only t.— J. H. G.] 



Merops bullockoides. Smith. White-fronted Bee-eater. 



Male and female, Rustenburg, June 11th. Irides dusky; 

 bill black ; tarsi and feet dusky. 



These Bee-eaters are exceedingly common about Rusten- 

 burg ; towards evening they go in flights, appearing to con- 

 gregate and roost at certain known localities, generally on 

 the sides of a gully with perpendicular banks, on the ledges 

 of which they sleep ; in such situations they also breed dur- 

 ing the summer months, as is evident from the many holes 



* Vide 'Illustrations of South-African Zoology/ Aves, pi. 101. 

 t I have recorded a similar instance of variation in this particular in 

 C. rupjena in ' The Ibis ' for 1877, p. ^41. 



