AND NORTHERN GUZERAT. 13 
sandy and grass maidans and bare cultivated or uncultivated 
ground, and does not assume the handsome black and_ chestnut 
plumage of the head, neck and abdomen much before February. 
I am doubtful whether the adults of this species retain the 
black crown and abdomen all the year round or not, but am in- 
clined to think that they do not, (Vide Vol. I., p. 232), as all of 
the birds when they first arrive, which is about the 3rd October, 
appear in what is described by Dr. Jerdon and Dr. Bree as the 
plumage of the young bird, remaining in that garb, a description 
of which I give below, until February, in which month they 
begin to assume the gay plumage of the adult birds. Surely all 
of the birds that visit this part of the country in the cold 
weather cannot be young birds ? 
Description.—Forehead, chin and throat, whole of lower parts 
(excepting breast) including abdomen, flanks and lower tail- 
coverts, under wing-coverts, axillaries, upper tail coverts, tail and 
secondaries, white ; upper plumage, including wing-coverts, terti- 
ary feathers nearest the body, scapulars and upper back olivaceous 
brown slightly glossed with green, most of the feathers being 
edged with pale buff; crown brownish, with dark centres and 
pale edgings to the feathers ; superciliary stripe, extending to the - 
occiput and meeting at the back of the head, buffy white; a 
dusky line below the white supercilium from the corner of the 
eye to the occiput; hind neck greyish brown, each feather 
edged pale; sides of neck and breast greyish white with dark 
greyish brown central stripes to the feathers, forming a broad 
pectoral band; first ten quills black, the inner web white 
at the base of*the first eight, and on nearly the whole of the 
inner web of the ninth and tenth. 
A broad black subterminal band on all of the tail feathers, 
except the two laterals on each side, broadest in the centre and 
narrowing gradually towards the sides; central tail feathers 
tipped rufescent or fawn; primary coverts black. A female 
measured in the flesh:—Length, 12°62; wing, 8; tail, 4; bill at 
front, 1°44; bill at gape, 1:19. Bill black and irides blackish or 
very dark brown, legs and feet black very faintly tinged with 
lake in many specimens, though the lake is scarcely observable. 
It feeds principally upon coleopterous insects, grasshoppers, small 
caterpillars, worms, &c., all of which I have myself taken from 
its stomach. 
[Common throughout the entire region during the cold season 
only. See also Stoliczka, J.A.S.B., 1872, p. 251.—A. O. H.] 
853.—Chettusia flavipes, Savign. OC. leucura, Licht. 
The White-tailed Lapwing occurs in small parties round the 
edges of many of the tanks between Ahmedabad and Deesa. 
It is not very common. 
