398. 
130. 
CAPRIMULGIDZ— CAPRIMULGINZ: TRUE GOATSUCKERS. 453 
frosted pattern of coloration. Markings of crown transverse; primaries barred with black and 
tawny. Size small. Sexes alike. Note dissyllabic. Eggs white. 
P. nut'talli, (To Thos. Nuttall.) Nurraty’s Poor-witt. ¢ 9, adult: Assuming the 
upper parts of a beautiful bronzy-gray ground color, this is elegantly frosted over with soft 
silver-gray, and watered in wavy cross-pattern with black, these black double crescents enlarg- 
ing to herring-bone marks on the scapulars and inner quills. Four middle tail-feathers patterned 
after the back; others with firmer black bars on motley brown ground, and short white tips. 
Primaries and longer secondaries bright tawny, with pretty regular black bars, and marbled 
tips (the half-opened wing viewed from below is curiously like that of the short-eared owl.) 
A large firm silky-white throat-bar. Under parts grounded in blackish-brown, giving way 
behind through ochrey with dark bars to nearly uniform ochrey. It is impossible in words to 
give an idea of the artistic blending of the colors in this elegant little night-jar. The sexes 
Fic. 295. — Night-hawk, or Bull-bat, 2? nat. size. (From Brehm. Bill too bristly.) 
searcely differ ; specimens before me marked @ have as purely white throat as the ¢, but the 
tail-tips are shorter and tinged with tawny. Length 7.00-8.00; extent 15.00; wing about 5.50; 
tail 3.50 or less; tarsus, or middle toe without elaw, 0.65. Plains to the Pacific, U. 8. and 
southward, abundant. Note of two syllables, the first of the “ whippoorwill” omitted. Eggs 
2, 1.05 X 0.80, elliptical, white. 
CHORDEDI'LES. (Gr. yopd4, chorde, a stringed musical instrument; Sein, evening: 
alluding to the crepuscular habits.) NiGuT-HAWKS. Glabrirostral: the rictus without long stiff 
bristles. Horny part of beak extremely small. Nostrils cylindric and rimmed about, hardly tubu- 
lar, opening outward and upward. Tarsus feathered part way down in front. Tail lightly forked, 
much shorter than the extremely long, pointed, stiff, and thin-bladed wing, with 1st primary 
as long as the next. Plumage more compact and smooth than in the night-jars ; primaries 
mostly whole-colored (in C. texensis spotted), with large white (or tawny) spaces on the outer 
4-6; under parts barred across; a large white (or tawny) V-shaped throat-bar. Eggs 2, 
heavily colored. Not strictly nocturnal. Remarkably volitorial. 
N 
