296 LARK. 



Anthus, Tern. Man. Ed. ii. Anal. p. lxix. 



African Lark, Gen. Syn. iv. 389. Shaw's Zool. x. 534. 



LENGTH eight inches. Bill black, one inch long, and bent 

 towards the point; plumage above mixed brown, rufons, and white, 

 in different shades ; wing coverts, quills, and tail, brown, edged with 

 white ; the under parts of the body white, marked with longitudinal 

 spots of brown ; legs brown, the hind claw seven lines long, straight, 

 and pointed at the end. 



The female is like the male, but more slender, and the bill shorter, 

 and less curved. In Levaillant's figure a white trace is seen above 

 the eye, and the tail appears somewhat forked. 



Inhabits the Cape of Good Hope, in all the sandy parts at Table, 

 and False Bay, and Saldanha ; is frequently seen perched on the 

 top of a hillock, and sounds the syllables, Sir rrrrrli, two or three 

 times over, elongating the last; hence the name given to the bird. 



The female lays her eggs on the ground, at the foot of a bush, 

 in a hollow, scratched out by the feet, on a bed of dry herbs, lined 

 with feathers, plucked from itself; the eggs are from three to five in 

 number, of a dirty grey, dotted with fulvous ; and both sexes sit in 

 turn. Frequent in Abyssinia ; and in general habit like the Com- 

 mon Lark. 



29— GREAT-BILLED LARK. 



L'Alouette a gros bee, Levail. Afr. iv. 128. pi. 193. 



BILL large, bent at the tip, brown, the under part pale at the 

 base; irides brown ; plumage brown, the feathers with paler margins ; 

 breast dirty white, spotted with black marks, the rest of the under 

 parts dirty, yellowish white ; quills and tail with yellowish mar- 

 gins, the last even at the end ; legs brown. 



The female the same, but smaller. This is common in the culti- 

 vated lands of the Cape of Good Hope, where the colonists call it 



