136 Letters, Extracts, Notices, ^c. 



believed by Mr. Hume^ who identified the specimens referred 

 to, and entered them under that name in my paper on the 

 birds oi: Sind contained in ' Stray Feathers ' (vol. vii. 

 p. 174). The remarks there recorded by me — viz.: "^One 

 of the most striking characters in the plumage of the adult 

 bird is the rufous halo that surrounds the moustachial stripe/' 

 — are, I think, sufficient to fix the species, as this peculiarity 

 does not exist in the other allied species with Avhich it is 

 likely to be confounded, namely, F. barbarus, F. punicus, and 

 F. minor. In F. babylonicus, male and female, adult and 

 immature, the moustachial stripe is the same rufous chestnut 

 as the top of the head, Avith a dark blackish or slaty-brown 

 centre, and this distinguishes it at a glance from all of its 

 allies above mentioned. I notice that this characteristic is 

 also referred to in ' Stray Feathers,' viii. p. 330, lines 4 to 11, 

 where an excellent description of that part of the bird will 

 be found. 



Mr. Gurney considers (Str. F. vol. x. pp. 481, 482) that 

 all of the Indian specimens identified by Mr. Hume as 

 F. barbarus are referable to F. bab<jlonicus, and in this im- 

 pression, so far as my experience goes, he is probably right. 



It is as well to take this opportunity also of correcting 

 another error in my paper on the avifauna of N. Guzerat 

 and Mount Aboo, in which (' Stray Feathers/ vol. iii. p. 443, 

 and vol. iv. p. 36) I unfortunately recorded the occurrence 

 o'i Falco peregrinator at Mount Aboo, whereas the bird I 

 obtained was, as I am now convinced, F. babylonicus. 



Had ' Stray Feathers ' been continued I should not have 

 asked you the favour of publishing this letter in ' The Ibis.' 



Yours &c., 



E. A. BuTLEK, Lieut. -Col. 



Carlisle, Nov. 9, 1888. 

 Sir, — I beg leave to state that, on the 18th of October 

 last, three examples of the Pectoral Sandpiper {Tringa ma- 

 culata) were observed in a grass-meadow near Penrith. Two 

 of the birds were shot. One of them fell into a snipe-pool and 

 was eaten by rats; the other was safely secured, and within 



