504 Mr. E. G. Meade-Waldo on the 



of most species, or finding the young too small to rear by 

 hand. The day that I landed I saw two pairs of the Pra~ 

 tincola, and watched carefully for it all the time I was in the 

 island. I came to the conclusion that it is thinly distributed 

 from the mountains to the sea-beach, and that it lives only 

 where there is some vegetation. Perhaps its favourite haunts 

 are the small barrancos on the north slope of the mountains; 

 but I procured two pairs on the sea-beach, and the cock bird 

 of a pair, which were feeding young ones, on a lava-stream. 

 It is a singularly quiet little bird, hardly putting itself out 

 when its young ones are being handled, flying tamely from 

 bush-top to bush-top, and occasionally uttering a low chut, 

 chut. 1 found two nests, each containing two large young. 

 The nests were placed on the ground under stones or, rather, 

 in one instance, under a rock. They are exceedingly early 

 breeders, as by the middle of February the young were full- 

 grown. After I left the island I got a clutch of three eggs, 

 evidently of this species, among a number of eggs sent from 

 the island ; they are very round and glossy, with a very 

 thick shell, of the colour of Blackbird's eggs but with the 

 spots very faint, or like intensely bright-coloured eggs of 

 Pratincola rubicola. 



I propose to describe this bird as a new species, and to 

 name it 



Pratincola dacotIjE, sp. nov. (Plate XV.) 

 P. ^ . Supra brunneo-nigra, fusco limbata : cauda brunnea, 

 rectricibus extimis albo limbatis : loris et capitis lateri- 

 bus nigris, linea supraoculari et postoculari alba, gula 

 et thorace albis : pectoris cinctura pallide castanea, ab- 

 domine albido : hypochondriis et crisso albis, secandariis 

 majoribus interioribus albis, reliquis albo marginatis : 

 rostro et pedibus nigris. 

 $ . Supra brunnea : gula, thorace et abdomine albidis, cinc- 

 tura castanea pectoris psene obsoleta, aliter mari similis. 

 Long. tot. 4 9, alse 2*5, caudse 2'3, rostr, "62, tars. '9. 

 Hub. Ins. Fuerteventura, Mauritanice Dacos. 

 In the ten specimens of this bird that I have in my collec- 

 tion there is no variation. I saw, however, one hen that was 

 feeding young ones, and which I would not shoot, with a very 



