TURTUR ERYTHROCEPHALUS. 565 
dense bush along the coast of Natal, and are generally seen on the 
ground, silently and busily seeking for food. They are rather shy 
birds, and not easy to obtain. The best method of doing so is to 
sit still in those parts of the bush which they frequent, when they 
soon begin to move about ; otherwise they watch from their thick 
covert any intruder who approaches, and, when he comes within a 
few yards, fly up with much bustle and are immediately out of sight. 
Their note is a low melancholy ‘coo-coo,’ rather prolonged and 
very guttural. There is not much difference in the plumage of the 
sexes; but the male is brighter and also larger than the female. It 
is seldom that more than two or three are found together.” 
In the Lydenburg district of the Transvaal Mr. Ayres states that 
these Doves are pretty common ‘‘in the dense bush and underwood 
of the kloofs ; but more than two are seldom found together. They 
utter a low melancholy note, and are not very easy to shoot as they 
are generally on the ground, and on the approach of anyone are up 
in a great bustle and are immediately lost to sight.” Mr. F. A. 
- Barratt also notes the species from the Macamac Gold-fields. 
General colour above dark-brown; back of the neck and head 
vinaceous, iridescent, with a beautiful coppery-green; forehead, top 
of head, and throat, white; under parts vinaceous, inclining to 
rufous on the belly and vent, and iridescent on the breast, with a 
coppery gloss; tail-feathers above, with the exception of the two 
central pair, cinereous-brown, cinereous on the tips, below the 
same, but the brown is darker, the cinereous lighter ; thighs brown. 
Length, 104’’; wing, 64’’; tail, 3’’ 9’. According to Captain 
Shelley the iris is “ deep lilac; the bill black ; bare skin round the 
eye, and the legs red.” 
Fig. Temm. and Knip, Pig. pl. 31. 
548. TurTUR ERYTHROCEPHALUS, Gray. Rufus-headed Turtle-Dove. 
The two preceding genera, Turturena and Haplopelia, have both 
been remarkable for metallic shades on the back of the neck and 
upper mantle, but this is entirely absent in the members of the 
genus Turtur, which have also a more or less defined black collar 
on the neck. JT. erythrocephalus, according to Captain Shelley’s 
arrangement, belongs to the group of typical Turtle-Doves which 
have the wings mottled, many of the scapulars and wing-coverts 
having their centres darker than their edges, while the collar is 
