2244 PLOVERS, SANDPIPERS, SNIPE, JACANAS, GULLS 



around to see if it is still pursued. Wheu alarmed, it often runs off and conceals 

 itself either by squatting close to the sand, or hiding under a stone or tuft of herb- 

 age, where its sand-colored plumage effectually conceals it from view. It generally 

 runs a little distance before taking wing, and seldom seems to fly very high. If a 

 flock be observed, they are usually seen scattered up and down the sandy tract, not 

 feeding close together. When danger threatens, each looks out for itself, taking 

 refuge in the nearest available cover, or crouching flat down on the sand.'' The 

 food of this bird consists of insects and their larvae, more especially the swarms of 

 grasshoppers frequenting its haunts. It is reported to generally lay its two or 

 three eggs in a hollow of the ground, which may be a natural one or excavated by 

 the bird itself; but in the Punjab it may nest among stubble or beneath tussocks of 

 grass. The eggs have an ochreous-buff ground color, blotched and speckled with 

 huffish brown, and marbled with grayish veinings which appear to underlie the 

 darker colors. 



This species (Pluvianus cegyptius) differs, as we have seen, in the 



ac - ac e ^^^^3^ o f the nasal region of the skull from its allies, and is on 

 Courser 



this account referred to a distinct genus. Externally, it may be rec- 

 ognized at a glance by its uniformly black back and scapulars, the black also ex- 

 tending as a band on each side of the breast, running forward as a streak below the 

 eye to the beak, and crowning the summit of the head. It resembles Jerdon's 

 courser (C. bitorquatus) of India, in having white bands across some of the primary 

 quills, and also in the absence of serrations on the claw of the third toe; while in 

 the relative shortness of the metatarsus it approaches Lich ten stein's courser (C. 

 senegalensis) of tropical Africa, in which the serrations of the claw of the third toe 

 may also be sometimes wanting. An accidental visitor to Spain, Algeria, and Pal- 

 estine, the black-backed courser inhabits the Nile valley, from Cairo to Khartum, 

 and thence ranges across Central Africa to the Gabun and Angola. 



This courser, often termed the black-headed plover, is very common on the 

 banks of the Nile, where several pairs may often be seen on a single sand bank, and 

 brings itself under notice by the loud chattering cry it utters every time it takes 

 wing. The most remarkable peculiarity in its habits is its custom of burying its 

 eggs in moist sand where they undergo incubation, the trait having been verified by 

 Captain Verner during the Sudan expedition. That gentleman on two occasions 

 had the good fortune to come across a clutch of three eggs thus buried, in the sec- 

 ond instance having seen the bird at work. A relative also noticed that in another 

 case one of the birds damped the sand round the eggs by first wetting its breast at 

 the water's edge, and then running to squat down for a couple of minutes. The 

 action of the sun on the damp sand gives rise to a bleaching process in the eggs, 

 which in their regularly oval cont5ur resemble those of the cream-colored courser. 



