694 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXIIL 



TuTnix alhiventris. — Hume, Str. Feath., i, p. 310; id, ibid, ii, 

 p. 281; id, ibid, iv, pp. 279-293; id, Oat., No. 834 ter.; Hume and 

 Marsh., Game B,, ii, p. 199; Ogilvie-Grant, Oat. B. M., xii, p. 445; 

 Blanford, Avifauna, B. I., iv, p. 154; Gates, Game B., i, p. 66; 

 Sharpe, Hand-List, i, p. 49; Le Mess, Game, S. and W. B. of Ind., 

 p. 115; Ogilvie-Grant, Game B., ii, p. 280. 



Vernacular -names. — Lowa (JJjp'per India), Pedda dabba gundla 

 (Telecju). In most places the natives do not distinguish betvreen 

 this bird and the Oommon Bustard Quail. 



Beseription : adult female. — From forehead to nape barred buff and 

 brown, with indications, sometimes well defined, of a buff mesial 

 stripe ; nape, neck, and extreme upper back bright ferruginous red : 

 remainder of upper parts, including inner wing coverts and inner- 

 most secondaries, greyish brown, occasionally an almost vinous tint, 

 profusely barred with fine wavy lines of deep brown or dull 

 black, giving these parts a vermiculated appearance, remaining wing 

 coverts buff or brownish buff with a broad sub-terminal drop or 

 short bar : inner secondaries like the back, and those next them 

 more or less freckled with rufous near the tip, and with black and 

 buff on the outer web near the tip, primaries, outer secondaries and 

 primary coverts greyish brown edged with buff on the outer webs, 

 edge of shoulder buff. Below from chin to upper breast reddish fer- 

 ruginous albescent, and often pure white on chin and throat, and of 

 the same colour on the upper breast as on the neck, these parts 

 forming a broad collar : remainder of lower surface buff, deepest on 

 the breast and flanks, and sometimes almost pure white on the centre 

 of the abdomen ; the breast next the collar in the centre, the sides 

 of this and the rest of the breast and flanks nearly as far down as the 

 thighs with large, round or crescentic spots of black. 



Females, adult but not so old, as that above described, have the 

 mesial line more strongly marked, the sides of the head are often 

 much marked with rufous, and the black barring is very broad and 

 prominent : the whole of the upper parts are much more heavily 

 spotted and barred with black : the scapulars, and sometimes the 

 back also, have drops of buff, succeeded by black on the outer webs 

 of the feathers, sometimes becoming buff streaks on the former ; the 

 inner secondaries and the wing coverts are a purer buff, and the 

 black drops or bars are far more numerous ; the inner secondaries 

 also as a rule have a good deal of rufous mixed with the vermicula- 

 tions. Below, the colour is much like that in the description already 

 given of the older female, but the grey-brown colour of the back 

 often encroaches on the sides of the breast, the black markings are 

 more numerous, and are occasionally mingled with pale buff spots. 

 The chin and throat are nearly always paler, and almost, if not quite, 

 white, and the buff of the belly is whitish, the centre of the abdomen 

 being often pure white. 



