194 BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 



times uniform bluish white, at others minutely freckled all 

 over with buff. 



Forehead, space between the bill and the eye, and the throat 

 greyish white, with a tinge of buff; all the upper surface ir- 

 regularly marked with beautiful transverse bars of grey, black 

 and chestnut, each feather on the back having a fine stripe 

 down the centre ; shoulders greyish brown, the remainder of 

 the wing marked with obscure transverse lines of grey, brown 

 and black ; primaries brown, mottled on the external edges 

 with greyish brown ; all the under sm'face buffy grey, each 

 feather having numerous zigzag markings of black, and many 

 of them having a very fine line of white down the centre ; bill 

 blue, deepening into black at the tip ; irides orange ; feet dull 

 yellow. 



Sp. 488. SYNOiCUS DIEMENENSIS, Gould. 

 Tasmanian Swamp-Quail. 



Syno'icus diemenensis, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc, part xv. p. 33. 

 Greater Brown Quail of the Colonists. 



Sjmoicus diemenensis, Gould, Birds of Australia, foL, vol. v. pi. 90. 



The Tasmanian Swamp-Quail is fully a third larger than the 

 Sj/noicus australis, and has the markings of the upper surfaces 

 more numerous and varied ; the situations it affects appear to 

 be low marshy grounds covered with dense masses of herbage. 

 The eggs I procured were found in the swamps immediately 

 below New Norfolk ; they are more green than those of S. 

 australis, are sprinkled all over with minute spots of brown, 

 and are from twelve to eighteen in number, one inch and seven- 

 sixteenths long by one inch and an eighth broad. 



Forehead, lores and chin greyish white tinged with buff; 

 crown of the head dark brown, with a line of buff down the 

 centre ; all the upper surface irregularly marked with beauti- 

 ful transverse bars of grey, black and chestnut, each feather 

 with a fine stripe of greyish white down the centre ; primaries 



