FRINGILLARIA CAPENSIS. 157 



Adult -male. Crown and mantle mottled, with blackish centres to the 

 feathers ; a band down the centre of the crown, edges of the other feathers 

 of the crown and nearly the whole of the sides and back of neck ashy- 

 brown shading into rufous brown on the mantle ; lower back, upper tail- 

 coverts and tail uniform brown, the latter with narrow partial rufous buff 

 edges to the feathers. Wings dark brown with the least and median coverts 

 entirely cinnamon and having broad cinnamon edges to the greater coverts 

 and inner secondaries, the latter gradually passing into narrow buff margins 

 on the primaries ; primary-coverts with very narrow partial buff edges ; 

 inner lining of wing dusky brown, with the under coverts buffy white and 

 the inner edges of the quills washed with that colour. Sides of head and 

 throat buffy white, with a broad black band through the eye and another 

 black band from the gape passing under the cheeks, round the back of the 

 ear-coverts and joining the other black band ; breast and under tail-coverts 

 buff with a dusky shade on the crop and sides of the body. Bill horn colour, 

 greyish towards the base of lower mandible; iris dark brown, legs nearly 

 black. Total length 6-1 inches, culmen 045, wing 3'1, tail 28, tarsus 08. 

 ^,24.1.74. Paarl (Shelley.) 



The Cape Rock-Bunting ranges from Angola into Cape 

 Colony, and is replaced by Reid's Rock-Bunting in South- 

 E astern Africa. 



The species has been recorded by Hartlaub, in 1857, as 

 forming part of Henderson's collection from Angola, and the 

 specimen described would appear to be very similar to those 

 from Cape Colony. One in the British Museum, obtained by 

 Andersson on May 23, 1864, at the Tioge river, to the north 

 of Lake Ngami, is remarkably pale in colour, and these are 

 the only two specimens recorded from the western side of 

 the Continent north of the Orange river. 



In Cape Colony these Rock-Buntings are fairly abundant 

 on Table mountain and in the surrounding country. 



Stark writes : " The Cape Bunting is almost invariably met 

 with in pairs on broken rocky ground, and in Western Cape 

 Colony is a common species from the sea level to about 5,000 

 feet in the mountains. Even on the barren sandy coast of 

 Little Namaqualand it is to be found wherever there is the 

 slightest outcrop of rock. The ' Steep Kopje ' is an extremely 



