140 BIRDS OF a PLATA 
broad tail four inches long, the total length of the 
bird being nine inches. The throat and space between 
the beak and eye are white ; all the rest of the body, 
also the wing and tail coverts, light grey; tail and 
wing-quills black, with a pure white band across 
the base of the primaries. The tertiaries and rectrices 
are tipped with pale rufous grey. 
It inhabits Brazil south of the equator, Bolivia, 
and Paraguay, also the northern provinces of the 
Argentine Republic. Mr. Barrows gives the following 
account of its lively habits in Entrerios: “‘ They 
are commonly seen perched on fences or the tops of 
bushes or trees in open ground, frequently making 
sallies for winged insects, or dropping to the ground 
to catch a grasshopper or worm. When shot at while 
perched and watching you, they almost invariably 
leave the perch at the flash, pitching forward and 
downward, and usually evading the shot, even at 
short range. Several times I have secured them by 
shooting about a foot below and two feet in front of 
them as they sat, but they do not always fly in this 
direction. The rapidity of their flight when fright- 
ened, or when quarrelling, is simply astonishing. I 
have seen one chase another for three or four min- 
utes, doubling, turning, twisting, and shooting, now 
brushing the grass, and now rising to a height of 
at least two or three hundred feet, and all the 
movements so rapid that the eye could scarcely 
follow them; and at the end of it each would 
go back to the top of his own chosen weed-stalk, 
apparently without a feather ruffled.” 
