GRALLATORES. 317 



aries, and all but the three or four external primaries with an 

 irregular triangular-shaped spot at the tip ; down the centre 

 of the throat a series of oblong marks of dark brown and white, 

 forming a conspicuous mottled stripe continued on to the 

 breast, where it is lost in the mingled grey and bnfFy brown 

 of the abdomen ; upper mandible dark reddish brown ; basal 

 portion of the lower one oil-green ; tibiae and hinder part of 

 the tarsi bright yellow ; remainder of the legs and feet yel- 

 lowish brown. 



Total length 17 inches ; bill 3f ; wing 7f ; tail 3 ; tarsi 2^. 



Sp. 561. BUTOROIDES JAVANICA. 



Little Mangrove-Bittern. 



Ardea javanica, Horsf. Linn. Trans., vol. xiii. p. 190. 



Butorides javanica, Bonap. Compt. Rend, de I'Acad. Sci., torn, xliii. 



seance du 2 Aout 1856. 

 Ardetta stagnatilis, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc, part xv. p. 221. 

 Wor-gorl, Aborigines of Port Essington. 

 Little Grey Bittern of the Colonists. 



Ardetta stagnatilis, Gould, Birds of Australia, fol., vol. vi. pi. 67. 



This bird is tolerably abundant at Port Essington and other 

 parts of the north coast of Australia, where its favourite 

 haunts are small islets covered with mangroves and low 

 swampy points of land running out into the sea; its chief 

 place of resort, however, is the dense beds of mangroves, 

 beneath the shade of which it runs about in search of food, of 

 which there is a great variety, such as fish, crustaceans, and 

 numerous marine worms and insects : when the tide rises and 

 the muddy beds and roots of the mangroves are covered with 

 water, the bird betakes itself to the higher braches, where it 

 sits motionless until the tide retires and leaves behind a fresh 

 supply of food. 



Although generally speaking it is a solitary species, yet at 

 times it congregates in considerable numbers. Gilbert found 



