BLUE-WINGED TEAL. 183 



Bill bluish-black. Iris dark hazel. Feet dull 

 yellow ; webs dusky ; claws brownish-black, with 

 the tips grayish-yellow. Upper part of the head 

 black ; a semilunar patch of pure white on the side 

 of the head before the eye, margined before and 

 behind with black ; the rest of the head and the 

 anterior parts of the neck of a deep purplish-blue 

 with purplish-red reflections ; the lower hind neck 

 and fore part of the back brownish-black glossed 

 with green. Each feather with a curved band of 

 pale reddish-buff, and a line or band of the same 

 in the centre ; the hind part of the back green- 

 ish-brown, the feathers edged with paler. The 

 smaller wing-coverts of a rich ultramarine blue, 

 silky, with almost metallic lustre. Alula, primary 

 coverts, and primary quills grayish-brown, edged 

 with pale bluish ; outer secondaries of the same 

 color, those of the speculum duck-green, changing 

 to blue and bronze, with a narrow line of white 

 along their terminal margin; the inner greenish- 

 black on the outer web, greenish-brown on the 

 inner, with a central line and narrow external 

 margin of pale reddish-buff, the more elongated 

 scapulars similar, but some of them margined with 

 greenish-blue. Secondary coverts brown, with 

 their terminal white. Tail feathers chocolate- 



