GLAREOLA. 215 



Coloration. Upper plumage brown, with an olive tinge when 

 freshly moulted, back of neck slightly rufous ; primaries and 

 earlier secondaries blackish, the secondaries gradually passing into 

 the brown of the tertiaries ; shaft of 1st primary whitish ; upper 

 tail-coverts white ; tail-feathers white at the base, broadly tipped 

 with blackish brown, most broadly on the median pair ; lores 

 black ; chin and throat pale rufous, surrounded by a narrow black 

 band running from above the gape on each side and slightly 

 bordered by white inside ; upper breast brown, passing down- 

 M-ards into rufous, which again passes into the white of the 

 abdomen and lower tail-coverts ; axillaries and under wing-coverts, 

 except near the edge of the wing, chestnut. 



Young birds in their first plumage have the feathers of the 

 upper parts with blackish ends and buff terminal spots, no gorget, 

 and the throat marked with brown longitudinal streaks ; the breast 

 dark. The upper plumage becomes uniform before the gorget 

 is assumed. 



Fig. 48. Head of G. orientalis. . 



Bill black ; gape red ; irides dark brown ; feet dusky black 

 (Jerdon). 



Length 9'5 ; tail to end of outer feathers 3 ; wing 7'25 ; tarsus 

 1-3; bill from gape 1. The outer rectrices are 0'75 to 1-25 

 longer than the middle pair. 



Distribution. India, Ceylon, and Burma, locally distributed, 

 keeping to the plains, also in the Andarnans and Nicobars, through 

 China to Eastern Siberia, and through the Malay countries and 

 Archipelago to Northern Australia. 



Habits, fyc. This Pratincole is generally found about the sandy 

 beds of large rivers, around tanks or open marshes, or on sandy 

 plains, as a rule in flocks that rest during the clay on the sand, 

 and hunt in the air for insects in the mornings and evenings. In 

 places this species is migratory, but it has been found breeding in 

 Sind, near Calcutta, in Ceylon, and in Pegu. It feeds principally 

 on moths, coleoptera, and hemiptera. The breeding-season in 

 Pegu and Sind is in April and May, and two or three eggs are 

 laid in a small hollow in the sand. The eggs are broad ovals, 

 very like those of Cursorius, of a pale stone colour, densely 

 blotched and spotted with blackish brown, and measuring about 

 1-18 by -93. 



