PICARIAN BIRDS AND PARROTS OF CEYLON. 24) 
They are fairly regular ovals, with a smooth texture, and a 
ground colour of salmon pink, or some approximate shade, 
marbled and mottled with brownish-red and faint purplish- 
gray. Average size 1:05 by ‘78. 
CAPRIMULGUS MACRURUS (Blanford, Vol. IIT., p. 188). 
CAPRIMULGUS ATRIPENNIS (Legge, p. 340). 
Horsfield’s Nightjar. 
Description—Male : General colour above a minutely 
mottled brownish-buff ; crown and hind-neck paler, with long 
black spots on the middle feathers ; lower hind-neck slightly 
tinged with rufous; scapulars with large velvety black 
patches, some feathers with buff bars and margins ; wing 
coverts mottled and stippled with black and buff; a white 
spot on the inner web of the first primary and on each web of 
second primary, a white bar across the third and fourth. 
Tail feathers blackish-brown with lighter mottlings, the 
two outermost pairs with broad white tips. Moustache stripe 
whitish ; chin, throat, and breast a finely mottled brown ; 
across the centre of the throat a patch of white feathers tipped 
with buff and black : abdomen and lower tail coverts fulvous, 
narrowly barred with dark brown. 
In females the spots on the primaries and tail feathers are 
smaller and buff coloured instead of white. 
Bill reddish-brown, tip black ; iris deep brown; legs brown. 
Length 10°5-11; wing 7; tail 5; tarsus +7; bill from 
gape 1°35. Females are smaller. Wing about 6:5. 
Distribution —More local than the preceding species, but 
fairly well distributed over the low-country and up to about 
3,500 feet. Blanford has united in one species three races : 
C. atripennis, a small form from Southern India and Ceylon ; 
C. macrurus, which ranges through the Malay Peninsula to 
Australia ; and C. albonotatus, which occurs in Northern 
India and Burma. 
Habits, &c.—More of a forest bird than C. asiaticus, but 
equally fond of squatting on paths after dark. It also 
frequently perches on dead branches of trees. It is found 
mainly in dry forest or chena, avoiding localities in which there 
