MALATAJT OBtflTHOLOGY. 189 



a very wet paddy -swamp, I shot a bird uncommonly like a Coot 

 (Fulica atra), except that its toes were very long, and without 

 lobe, web, or any other aid to swimming ; it flew with a heavy 

 flapping flight close over the tops of the reeds. It was of black 

 plumage, but a good deal marked with a rusty brown ; also it had- 

 a little white on its shoulders ; irides dark brown ; length 15 

 inches ; claws long, very curved and sharp ; legs yellowish green, 

 as was the beak, which extended up the forehead in the form of a 

 reddish frontal plate ; so I take the bird to be a young male 

 in breeding-plumage ; in the adult the iris is crimson." 



Again, in my notes I find : — 



" Singapore, 22nd December, 1877. To-day I got four couple 

 of Snipe in the valley near Cluny, also shot a female specimen 

 of the Water-cock (G. cristata), which Drake flushed out of a 

 thick patch of reeds standing in water nearly two feet deep. 

 Though at different times I have shot dozens of these birds, I 

 never remember finding them anywhere but in very wet places ; 

 in Perak they were exceedingly plentiful on all the jheels, but 

 kept to the thick reed-beds. During last spring I shot a great 

 many on the jheels near Saiyong and Kota Lama, and found 

 them very good eating, though in that respect not equal to the 

 little G-oose Teal. 



' J The great difference in size of the sexes of this bird is very 

 noticeable : the female I shot to-day is 13 inches in length ; irides 

 dark brown ; legs and beak dull green, the latter reddish at its. 

 base ; head and the upper parts dark brown ; the feathers of the 

 back, also the tertiaries, broadly edged with pale brown ; chin, 

 throat, supercilia, outer web of first primary, and the shoulder 

 white ; underparts pale rufous brown, narrowly barred with dusky 

 brown, particularly on the flanks." 



The male is a larger bird, about 16 inches in length, and, 

 when mature, has red irides and its plumage very dark. 



In Singapore I once put up a Water-cock which flew a short 

 distance, then settled on the top of some bushes eight or ten 

 feet above the ground, a most unusual thing for one of these 

 birds to do. It looked most strangely out of place ; so I shot it 

 in order to be sure of its identitv. -_ 



