290 CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE ONRITHOLOGY OF INDIA. 



■with others have® repeatedly taken its eggs. The bird I refer 

 to has the wing 45. This is the common species all over 

 India, whereas the so-called small Indian plover, which has 

 the wing on the average 4, is much rarer. 



Davison says of the present species : — ie I obtained only one 

 specimen of this bird shot at Aberdeen, South Andaman, soon 

 after my arrival there. I did not meet with if again, nor did 

 I see it at the Nicobars.'" I shot one or two on the Cocos 

 and Preparis, but not having then realized its comparative 

 rarity in the islands of the Bay of Bengal, did not preserve 

 them. 



858 Ms.— Esacus magnirostris, Geoffr. (2.) 



This very fine species, hitherto known only from Australia and 

 the more eastern portion of the Archipelago, occurs and breeds 

 alike in the Cocos and the Andamans. We shot single speci- 

 mens at both the Great and Little Cocos ; at the latter we obtain- 

 ed an egg. We saw the bird, but failed to obtain a specimen at 

 Escape Bay in Macpherson/s Straits. Mr. Mason the year 

 previously obtained an egg, precisely similar to the one we got, 

 and which must have belonged to this species, at Corbyu's 

 Cove, a few miles south of Port Blair. One egg was obtained 

 on 24th March ; it was quite fresh, and was placed in a small 

 depression in the coral sand a little above high water mark, both 

 parents, one of which we secured, were standing close to it. 

 Mr. Mason's egg was obtained on the 15th April. The eggs 

 closely resemble those of E. recurvirostris ; but are hand- 

 somer, aud I think more elongated. They are large oval 

 eggs, usually I judge a good deal compressed towards one end. 

 The shell is tolerably tine and smooth, but the egg has no gloss. 

 The ground is a creamy stone color or very pale cafe au lait, 

 boldly blotched, streaked and spotted with blackish brown, 

 paling in some places to a yellowish or raw Sienna brown. 

 Besides these primary markings a few small pale inky purple 

 sub-surface looking spots and clouds are thinly scattered 

 everywhere about the egg. The blackish brown markings are 

 chiefly confined to the large end. The eggs measure 2'6 by 

 175. The largest E. recurvirostris egg that I have ever 

 obtained, and I have taken a vast number, measured 2*32 by \'7. 

 The average is 2*15 by 1*59. 



This present species is readily distinguished from the com- 

 mon Indian one by its comparatively enormous bill, (which is 

 not only longer but very much broader and deeper,) and by the 

 much greater amount of dark brown about the face and on 



