198 PHASIANID^ FRANCOLINUS 



Shelley, B. Afr. i, p. 180 (1896) ; Woodward Bros. Natal Bds. p. 160 

 (1899) ; Marshall, Ibis, 1900, p. 262 ; Beichenow, Vog. Afr. i, p. 492 

 " (1901). 

 " Iswempe " of Zulus (Woodward). 



Description. Adult Male. — Crown of the head and a stripe from 

 behind the eye to the upper ear-coverts reddish-chestnut ; sides of 

 the face and neck all round ochre-yellow, paling into white on the 

 chin ; rest of the upper surface grey and pale chestnut, most of the 

 feathers With conspicuous shaft stripes of yellow-buff; primaries 

 and secondaries slaty-black, the latter banded on the inner webs with 

 chestnut ; tail chestnut and black ; below, including the sides of the 

 breast, white, shading on the under tail-coverts to pale buff with 

 transverse bands of black, which gradually disappear on the 

 abdomen and under tail-coverts ; a single moderate spur. 



Iris light hazel-brown ; bill ashy-horn, yellow at the gape ; tarsi 

 and feet bright yellow. 



Length 11-0 ; wing 54 ; tail 2-7 ; culmen -80 ; tarsus 1-4. 



The female has a black superciliary line running above the eyes 

 and ear-coverts, which nearly joins a second one ; this commencing 

 on the lores and running below the eye, passes down the neck and 

 then across to join its fellow, circumscribing the white throat ; the 

 back is much more chestnut than in the male ; the breast is reddish- 

 chestnut with very narrow yellow shaft lines : as a rule the tarsus 

 bears no spurs. 



Distribution. — The Coqui was first discovered and described by 

 Sir Andrew Smith from the neighbourhood of Kurrichane, in the 

 present Rustenburg district of the Transvaal ; it is found throughout 

 that Colony (especially in the bushveld), Bechuanaland, Rhodesia 

 and Natal, extending to the Okavango River and southern Angola in 

 one direction, and through Nyasaland, and German and British East 

 Africa, as far as Mombasa in the other. 



The following are recorded localities : Natal — near Durban 

 (Shelley and Millar), Howick (Woodward) ; Transvaal — Potchef- 

 stroom and Rustenburg (Ayres), Barberton (Rendali), Zoutspansberg 

 (S. A. Mus.) ; Bechuanaland — Kanye {Bxton, in S. A. Mus.), 

 Bamangwato (Buckley), Ngamiland (Bryden) ; Rhodesia — Buluwayo 

 (Ayres), Zambesi (Bradshaw), near Salisbury (Marshall). 



Habits. — This, the smallest and perhaps the handsomest of the 

 South African Francolins, is usually found in small coveys of from 

 6 to 12 individuals; it frequents open bush country where the grass 

 is fairly short and the ground is dotted with scrub, and is seldom far 



