PINTAIL. 9 
hutch of a dealer throughout the summer, that did not 
exhibit any change at all.’ 
The following is Montagu’s description of a male Pintail, 
after he had thrown off the masculine plumage, taken on 
the 19th. of August:—‘Bill, as usual; top of the head, and 
from thence down the back of the neck, dusky and pale 
ferruginous, intermixed in minute streaks, paler on the forehead; 
sides of the head and throat, brown, with minute dusky 
specks, tinged with ferrnginous; the front and sides of the 
neck, brown, with dusky black spots which are minute on 
the upper part, becoming larger by degrees downwards, where 
they are also more distinct, the breast very pale brown, 
with more distant dusky spots; the back and scapulars are 
only black, with pale margins, each feather having a transverse 
bar of white near the tip; the longer scapulars are only 
margined with rufous white, and some are powdered with 
white. As they approach the tail the feathers gradually lose 
the white bar, so that the tail coverts are only margined 
with white; the feathers on the sides of the body being large, 
have broad margins, with the middle dusky black, in which 
is either a ferruginous white bar, or two spots, one on each 
side of the shaft; the prime quills dusky grey, as usual; the 
speculum changeable green, or copper, tipped with white; a 
violet bar dividing the green from the white. The first 
tertial is brown on the inner web, grey on the outer, near 
the shaft, and a broad margin of violet; the rest of the 
tertials are brown, dashed with cinereous black near the shafts; 
the coverts of the wings plain dark cinereous, the larger 
series tipped with bay; the tail consists of sixteen dusky 
feathers, dashed with cinereous, gradually becoming darker 
towards the middle feathers, which rather exceed the rest in 
length, making the tail regularly cuneiform; vent, and under 
tail coverts, rufous white, with distant black spots. 
At the annual autumnal moult, the males again assume, 
with their new feathers, the colour peculiar to their sex, but 
the assumption is gradual. White spots first appear among 
the brown feathers on the front of the neck; by the end 
of the second week in October the front of the neck and 
breast are mottled with brown and white; at the end of 
the third week in October a few brown spots only remain on 
the white.’ 
