274 A HANDBOOK OF EUROPEAN BIRDS. 
white ; bill dark brown, ora at base ; legs and feet black ; 
irides hazel. Length 18°5 to 19 inches; culmen 3°38; wing 
8°25; tail 3°45; tarsus 2°75. 
Adult Female (Summer): Much less brilliant in tint 
than the male and considerably larger. 
Adult (Winter) : ‘The general colour of both the upper 
and under parts resembles that of the Bar-tailed Godwit, but 
the dark shaft-streaks of the feathers are absent. The wings, 
wing-coverts, lower back, upper tail-coverts, and tail of the 
Black-tailed Godwit in winter resemble those of summer, and 
are points which serve at all ages and in all seasons to distin- 
guish this species from the Bar-tailed Godwit ” (Seebohm.) 
Young in first plumage: “ Differ from adults in winter 
plumage in having the feathers of the head, neck, breast, and 
flanks suffused with buff, and those of the mantle, scapulars, 
and innermost sécondaries broadly edged with buff” (See- 
bohm). 
Distribution : Summer visitant to many parts of Europe 
and to Siberia, wintering in the Mediterranean region, and as 
far south in Asia as Ceylon. 
Habitat: Very similar to that of Z. dapponica. 
Genus NUMENIUS. 
CURLEW. 
Numenius arquata (Zzvz.). 
Adult: Head, neck and breast brownish-buff, tinged with 
rufous, the shafts and central portion of the feathers dark 
brown ; mantle and scapulars blackish-brown, the feathers more 
or less broadly margined with pale rufous-brown ; lower back 
and rump white, boldly spotted with blackish ; tail white, shaded 
with brownish-buff, and barred with brown; primaries dark 
brown blotched with white on inner webs ; chin and abdomen 
white, the latter streaked with brown; flanks barred, streaked 
and shaded with brown; #77 (long and decurved) brown, 
blackish towards tip; legs and feet dusky; irides brown. 
Length (male) about 20 inches; culmen 4 to 4°7; wing II; 
tarsus: 3. 
