714 BIRDS OF INDIA. 



blue ; beneath, the lower part of the cheeks, chin, and throat 

 pale coerulean blue, more or less edged with purplish grey, and 

 passing into the purer blue of the lower neck and breast ; abdomen, 

 sides of the body and vent, abruptly deep purple, the thigh-coverts 

 dull blue ; under tail-coverts pure white ; lower wing-coverts dull 

 pale blue, quills and tail beneath glossy blackish. 



Bill red, darker on the culmen, and with a blood-red spot at 

 the base of each mandible ; the casque cherry red ; irides brick- 

 red ; legs dull pale brick-red. Length 18 to 19 inches; extent 

 30 to 32; wing 10; tail 4 ; tarsus 3^ ; middle toe and claw 4| ; hind 

 toe and claw 2\. 



The Purple Coot is found throughout all India and Ceylon, 

 wherever there are weedy lakes, extensive marshes, or reedy 

 rivers. It is social, and prefers those lakes and j heels where there 

 are clumps of bushes here and there, on which it can perch, which 

 it does very readily. It walks and runs rapidly over the surface 

 of weedy lakes, and makes its way easily through thick reeds. Its 

 flight is rather heavy and never prolonged far. It has a loud 

 and somewhat fowl-like call. It feeds chiefly on seeds and vege- 

 table matter, committing much havoc on the rice fields. It makes 

 a large nest of grass, rice stalks, and the like, at the edge of the 

 water, and lays six to eight eggs of a reddish or buff ground, with 

 numerous small dark red and purplish spots. One writer in an Indian 

 Periodical states that it makes its nest by excavating the ground 

 under a bank of earth, among grass jungle ; and he adds that 

 the Natives assert that when a bird is wounded or killed, the body 

 is conveyed by its comrades to one of these retreats, but this of 

 course is unfounded. 



The eggs are occasionally taken and set to fowls, and the young 

 reared. It thrives well in confinement, and has then been observed 

 laying hold of stalks of grain or other food with one of its feet. I 

 am not aware that ovivorous propensities have been exhibited by this 

 species, but an African bird, Porph. veterum, Gmel., (Jiyacinthinus, 

 Temm.) found in several of the Mediterranean Islands, is said to 

 destroy large numbers of wild ducks' eggs, by sucking them ; one 

 was seen to seize a duckling in its huge foot, crush its head and 

 eat the brains, leaving the rest untouched. 



