436 PROCEEDINGS OF SPXTIOX D. 



(JhHervatiuns. — As Gould observes, this beautiful and delicate 

 little dottrel avoids the boisterous and exposed sea beaches, pre- 

 ferring to dwell on the serener margins of rivers and lagoons in. 

 the more genial climate of the interior. That great naturalist was 

 the first to take its eggs, which he found deposited on the groimd 

 beside the Namoi River, New South Wales. 



My earliest recollections of this tame little species was the 

 finding of a clutch of eggs on the shores of the Albert Park 

 Lagoon, near Melbourne, by a schoolfellow, about 1869. 



In the MS. left for my perusal by my good friend, Hermann 

 Lau, I find, with regard to ^yia:ilis niyri/nms, he says :— '•It was 

 a long time before I was enabled to find its breeding-place, 

 because of its cunningness and the similarity of the eggs to the 

 color of the ground. Even when I first found the shell at 

 Waroo (Queensland), on account of its large size, I could not 

 accept it as belonging to this dear little bird had I not discovered 

 near at hand three helpless young in a small gravel hollow 

 between about half a dozen larger pebbles. Nothing soft was 

 inside the nesting hollow, save remnants from insect food. On 

 another occasion, while proceeding along a wide pebbly ridge, 

 with the creek on one side and an ana-branch on the other, I 

 found, by mere chance, three eggs, and observed the bird not far 

 off. Birds, eggs or young, and pebbles are all much alike in color. 

 There are evidently two broods in the season, because I have 

 noticed eggs and young in October and again in December." 



JEGIALITIS RUFICAPILLA. 

 JliJD-CAPPED Dottrel. 



Figure — Gould : Birds of Australia, fob, vol. vi., pi. 17. 



Ramsay'' s Tab. List — u^yialitis rujicapilla, Temm. 



Previous Descriptions of Eyys — Gould : Birds of Australia 

 (1848), also Hdbk., vol. ii., p. 236 (1865). Harting : Proc. Zool. 

 Soc, p. 459, with fig. (1874). Ramsay : Proc. Zool. Soc, p. 337 

 (1877). North: Cat. Nests and Eggs Austr. Bds., with %., p, 

 306(1889). 



Geoloyical Distribution — Whole of Australia, Tasmania, and 

 New Guinea. 



Nest — Usually of slight depression in the sandy ridges of the 

 sea beach, sometimes ornamented with pieces of dried herbage or 

 seaweed or a few small shells in the centre. 



Eyys — Clutch, 2 ; shape, pyriform ; shell, soft in appearance 

 and lustreless ; ground color, pale stony grey or stone-color, marked 

 with blotches, dots, and minute splashes of dark brown or sepia. 

 In some clutches the markings are finer in character and distri- 

 buted over the surface, while in other instances they are more 



