CEYLON RAILS, WADERS, GULLS, AND TERNS. 223 
streaked with brown. Remainder of lower parts white ; the 
axillaries and wing lining dusky brown barred with white. 
Summer: The crown and hind neck are much streaked 
with white ; the back is spotted with white, and the brown 
streaks on the sides of head and neck and on the upper breast 
are broader and more conspicuous. 
Bill deep brown, greenish round the nostrils and at the 
base of the lower mandible ; iris hazel-brown ; legs and feet 
dingy green, grayish, or bluish. 
Length 9°5; wing 5:5; tail 2°5; tarsus 1:3; bill from 
gape 1-5. 
Distribution —Sandy beds of rivers in the northern half of 
the Island ; also on streams up-country. Common in Northern 
India, rarer in Burma and Southern India. Occurs through- 
out the Old World, breeding in the north and wintering in the 
south. 
Habits —Not a very common bird with us, and seldom seen 
away from the beds of streams, though in Northern India it 
frequents marshes or even paddy fields. It is a wary bird, 
with a much louder note than that of the last species. About 
our earliest migrant, arriving in August and not leaving till 
May. 
TOTANUS STAGNATILIS (Blanford, Vol. IV., p. 263 ; 
Legge, p. 844). 
The Marsh Sandpiper ; Little Greenshank. 
Description.—Winter : General colour above ashy-brown, 
the feathers with paler edges and inconspicuous darker shaft- 
stripes. The wing coverts and primaries are dark brown ; 
greater coverts, later primaries, and secondaries edged with 
white, lower back and rump white ; upper tail coverts white, 
sometimes barred with brown ; tail white irregularly barred 
with brown, the central feathers and the outer webs of the rest 
tinged with ashy-brown. The forehead, lores, cheeks, and 
under parts white, with brown streaks on the sides of the 
upper breast, neck, and of the head behind the eye. 
Summer: The general tone of the upper plumage is ashy- 
gray tinged with brown ; there are conspicuous black angular 
