72 GAME BIRDS OF INDIA. 



rump, and upper tail-coverts finely barred black, and whitish, or 

 grey ; wings with the coverts black, with broad bay or rufous 

 edges, and the quills barred with rufous and black ; tail black, 

 the middle feathers barred with black and grey, on the upper parts ; 

 the lateral feathers being similarly barred at their base only ; 

 plumage beneath, from the rufous collar, deep black, more or less 

 banded on the lower part of the abdomen with white, and the 

 flanks of the breast and abdomen spotted with white ; thigh-coverts 

 and under tail-coverts chesnnt. 



Bill black-; irides brown; legs yellowish red. Length 13 to 

 14 inches; extent 20; wing 5|; tail 3J. Weight 13 to 15 oz. 



The female differs in wanting the black head and neck of the 

 male, which is more or less rufous, mixed with brown, the throat 

 and sides of the neck being white, and a dusky band surrounds the 

 white portion of the ear-coverts ; the back and wings are dusky, 

 with pale rufous edges, whitish on the wing ; the back, rump, and 

 upper tail-coverts, are barred pale rufous and dark brown ; the 

 tail feathers blackish, with pale bands ; the medial pair brown 

 banded ; beneath, from the throat, the plumage is white with 

 black spots, longitudinal and arrow-shaped in front, becoming 

 more transverse on the flanks and lower abdomen. 



Length 12^ to 13 inches ; weight 12 to 13 oz. 



The males have a short blunt spur, tubercular at first. 



The black Partridge is found throughout the whole of Northern 

 India, from the Himalayas to the valley of the Ganges, but not 

 that I am aware of, extending to any distance beyond the valley of 

 the Ganges until above Allahabad, beyond which it passes to the 

 Punjab, and southwards, through Eajpootana to Sindh and per- 

 haps to Goozrat. Eastwards it extends through Dacca to Assam, 

 Sylhet and Tipperah, but I have seen no record of its occurrence 

 further south in this direction, and it is replaced in Burmah 

 by an allied species. It occurs south of the Ganges between 

 that river and the Hooghly, and I have seen notices of the black 

 Partridge having been shot in Midnaporc and Cuttack, but it is 

 certainly rare, south of the Ganges. Various notices appear in 

 several pages of the Bengal Sporting Magazine of Black Partridges 

 occurring in the Saugor and Ncrbudda territories, Mhow and Bun- 



