1844.] for December Meeting, 1842. 387 



and interscapularies ashy-brown ; the rump dark grey ; wings and tail 

 dusky-brown, the outermost feather of the latter slightly albescent : 

 throat, fore-neck, and breast, bright ferruginous ; the belly and under 

 tail-coverts fulvescent- white. Bill dark horn-colour, and legs appear 

 to have been leaden-brown. 



A supposed young female is smaller, having the wing but three 

 inches, and tail two and three quarters. The nestling garb appears to 

 be retained about the nape, where the feathers are of open texture, 

 and of a light brown colour. Crown and ear-coverts dark ashy; and 

 the colours generally are less deep, the breast being of a much weaker 

 ferruginous, still more diluted on the throat. Bill imperfect, and what 

 remains of it induces me rather to doubt the specifical identity of this 

 with the preceding specimen. Both, with M. leucogastra, have the bill 

 remarkably broad at base, and approximating the Muscipetce. 



Vanellus leucurus (?) ; Charadrius leucurus (?), Lichtenstein, 

 mentioned in Griffith's work to inhabit Tartary, as well as Egypt 

 and Nubia. I have obtained a single specimen in the Calcutta bazar 

 of a species which I doubt not is the Tartarian bird here alluded to,* 

 but whether perfectly identical with the African species is more 

 doubtful. As compared with the figure in the great French work on 

 Egypt, this Asiatic specimen differs in having no trace of the rufous- 

 isabelline tint represented, beyond a mere blush of this hue on the ab- 

 dominal region, and there is no defined grey patch on the breast. 

 Length (of a female) eleven inches, by twenty-three inches in alar 

 expanse ; wing seven inches ; tail two and three-quarters ; bill to 

 forehead an inch and one-eighth ; tarse two inches and five-eighths. 

 Irides reddish-amber ; bill black, and legs and toes bright yellow, the 

 claws black. General colour brownish-grey, with a reddish-purple 

 gloss on the mantle, extending over the tertiaries ; head and neck 

 browner and glossless, the throat and around the bill white ; breast 

 more ashy, the feathers margined paler ; rest of the under-parts, with 

 the tail and its upper coverts, white, the belly and flanks conspicu- 

 ously tinged with dull rosy, or a roseate-cream hue ; primaries and 

 their coverts black, the secondaries and their coverts largely tipped 



* Here may be mentioned that I have likewise procured a beautiful fresh specimen 

 of the Anas formosa, Gmelin, shot on the salt-water lake near Calcutta, which 

 species is described to frequent Lake Baikal, and was unknown to Mr. Hodgson who 

 had never met with it in Nepal. The tracheal bony vesicle is but slightly developed. 



