ALAUDULA MINOR. 139 



Alaudula minor. 



Calandritis minor, Cab. Mus. Hein. i. p. 123 (1850) N.E. Afr. 

 Alaudula minor, Sharpe, Cat. B. M. xiii. p. 588 (1890) ; Shelley, B. Afr. 

 I. No. 193 (1896). 



Adult. Above mottled sandy brown, with dark brown centres to the 

 feathers ; outer edge of the first long primary white ; tail with the outer 

 feather white, with a dusky wedge-shaped patch on the inner web ; penul- 

 timate feather with the white confined to the outer web ; eyebrow, feathers 

 under the eye, and the ear-coverts sandy buff; a blackish mark in front of the 

 eye, and a few dark shaft-stripes on the cheeks, ear-coverts, and sides of the 

 throat, the white of the throat extending on to the sides of the neck to 

 behind the ear-coverts ; remainder of the sides of the neck like the back, and 

 separated from the lower throat by a fairly well marked dusky band ; lower 

 half of the throat closely marked with elongated spots of dusky brown ; 

 flanks with more faintly marked streaks ; under wing-coverts and inner 

 margins of the quills rufous buff, with the remainder of the quills dusky. 

 Iris dark brown ; bill dull horn colour ; tarsi and feet pale brown. Total 

 length 5'3 and 4-9 inches, culmen 0-4, wing 8-5 and 3-2, tail 2-2 and 2-0, 

 tarsus 0-8. ,? , S , 7. 4. 97. Central Tunis (J. P. S. Whitaker). 



The lesser Short-toed Lark ranges from the Canary Islands 

 eastward through Egypt and Nubia into Palestine and the 

 countries bordering the Persian Gulf. 



The type specimen came from North-east Africa, and 

 Heugliu, in his work on the birds of that sub-region, records 

 the species as a migrant in Arabia, Egypt and Nubia, where 

 it occurs in small flocks near the deserts. 



It is not improbable that the large flocks referred to 

 G. brachydactyla by Brehm and Heuglin may have included 

 some of the present species, as they have both much the same 

 habits and distribution, excepting that G. minor apparently 

 entirely replaces G. brachydactyla in the Canary Islands. 



Genus XVI. OTOCOEYS. 



Bill moderate ; nostrils hidden by stiff plumelets. Wing of only nine 

 primaries, long and pointed; secondaries falling decidedly short of tip of 

 wing by more than the length of the tarsus ; first three primaries about 



