304 ALLEN'S NATURALIST'S LIBRARY. 



crown of head uniform, like the back, or only slightly streaked 

 with blackish ; lores dusky-blackish, surmounted by a broad 

 streak of white ; eyelid white ; sides of face and ear-coverts 

 brown, streaked with white ; cheeks, throat, and under surface 

 of body white, the throat with hair-like blackish streaks ; sides 

 of neck, fore-neck, and chest ashy-brown, with whitish vermi- 

 culations, or whitish mottled with ashy-brown; breast and ab- 

 domen pure white, freckled with bars and vermiculations of 

 ashy-brown on the sides of body and flanks ; thighs and under 

 tail-coverts white, the latter with a few bars of blackish; under 

 wing-coverts white, barred with sub-marginal markings of black- 

 ish; axillaries white, with dusky bars, not very perfect, of brown ; 

 lower primary-coverts and quills below ashy, the former with 

 whitish bars near the end. Total length, 9 inches ; culmen, 

 1-45 ; wing, 67 ; tail, 2-3 ; tarsus, 2. 



Adult Female. Similar to the male. Total length, 9-5 inches; 

 culmen, r6; wing, 6-5; tail, 2*2; tarsus, 2-25. 



Adult Male in Breeding Plumage. Differs from the winter 

 plumage in being mottled with black, the centres to the 

 feathers being black ; median and greater wing-coverts being 

 more or less conspicuously barred and notched with black ; 

 centre tail-feathers ashy-brown, barred with black, the lateral 

 ones white with less complete blackish bars ; head black, 

 streaked with white; under surface of body white, with 

 blackish streaks on the sides of the face, throat, and breast, 

 the latter broader and more arrow-shaped; the sides of the 

 breast distinctly barred with black ; axillaries with only a few 

 blackish bars ; bill black ; feet bright yellow ; iris dark brown. 

 Total length, 9 inches; culmen, 1-4; wing, 6-4; tail, 2-45; 

 tarsus, 1*9. 



Young after First Moult. Much more mottled than the winter 

 plumage of the adult, which it otherwise resembles ; all the 

 feathers having spots or notches of brownish-white on the mar- 

 gins ; the throat and chest minutely streaked with ashy-brown, 

 and the sides of the breast mottled with larger spots of ashy- 

 brown ; axillaries almost entirely white, with scarcely any evi* 

 dences of dusky bars. 



Characters. -The Yellow-shank is distinguished from both of 

 the Red-shanks by having the lower back and rump dusky- 



