654 BIRDS OF SOUTH AFRICA. 
625. Cursorius SENEGALENSIS, Licht. Senegal Courser. 
This species may be distinguished from 0. rufus by its smaller 
size, and by the absence of white on the secondaries. It is generally 
distributed throughout the colony, and has been sent from Natal by 
Mr. Ayres, who says that it is scarce there. ‘They frequent the 
open country, and are to be found after the grass has been burnt 
off, when, I have no doubt, they more easily find their food. These 
birds run with extraordinary swiftness, much faster than any of 
the other kinds of Plovers here, notwithstanding their small size.” 
Captain Reid met with several small flocks on flats near the Tugela, 
at Colenso. In the Lydenburg district of the Transvaal Mr. Ayres 
says that it is scarce. A single specimen was obtained by Mr. 
Andersson at Ondonga, in Ovampo Land, and Senor Anchieta has 
sent it from many localities in Mossamedes and Benguela. 
Mr. Gurney states that this Courser may be distinguished from 
its ally, C. rufus, by its “slightly smaller dimensions, by the 
somewhat brighter tint of the rufous portion of the plumage, by the 
greater size and intensity of the blackish abdominal patch, by the 
absence of grey from the occiput, and by the less extended white 
tipping of the secondary feathers of the wing.” 
Fig. Swains. B. West Afr. ii, pl. 24. 
626. Cursorius Bicinctus, J’emm. 
South African Two-banded Courser. 
We procured what we took to be, from the anxiety of the birds 
hanging about the place, two eggs of this species. They are of a 
light nankin-yellow ground, densely covered with thin compressed 
streaks of dark brown, so closely distributed as almost to hide the 
ground-colour, Axis, 14’; diam., 12’”. 
Mr. Atmore sends several eggs, and confirms us in my opinion 
of the parentage of the eggs I took. He writes :—“ It lays one egg 
only on the bare ground, without even scratching a hole; prefers 
bare grey places by road-sides. I picked up nearly twenty on my 
road home from the Nieuw Veldt, by watching them run away from 
a small flock of sheep, in September and October.’ It has been 
found near Grahamstown and in the Free State by Mr. Windham. 
Mr. T. C. Atmore forwarded a pair to us from Hopetown. Mr. 
Barratt writes: “I first found this little bird rnnning rapidly along 
between the herbage growing on the flats near Sandy River, Orange 
