THE BLUE-BREASTED BANDED RAIL. 251 



three other specimens from India, Burma, and the Malay- 

 Peninsula, the wings vary from 44 to 5*0. There is not a single 

 specimen in my large series in which the wing exceeds 5*1. 



As for the colours of the soft parts, these vary to an extent 

 that is quite incomprehensible ; the irides are most commonly 

 reddish brown, but they are also light yellowish brown, yellow- 

 ish chestnut, vandyke brown, Sienna brown, pale brown, Indian 

 red, and litharge red ; the legs and feet are plumbeous green, 

 olive green, fleshy grey, greyish brown, brown, greenish brown, 

 slaty green, leaden blue, " leaden grey, tinged with greenish and 

 brown" (Swinhoe), and " dirty buff" (Ramsay). 



The bill varies equally ; the following are the colours as recorded 

 by myself and others ; — upper mandible dusky brown ; gape 

 and lower mandible orange, shading to brown at tip ; — culmen 

 deep brown ; basal portion of bill rosy red ; terminal portion 

 greyish brown ; — " bill purplish brown ; base dull crimson" 

 (Everett) ; — " bill bright plum colour" (Ramsay) ; — bill dull 

 Indian red, except along ridge of culmen, which is dark brown ; — 

 upper mandible dark brown ; lower mandible and triangular patch 

 at base of upper mandible pink ; — bill purple ; culmen dark 

 brown ; — " bill bright madder pink on basal two-thirds, light 

 violet grey on apical one-third ; culmen dark" ( SwinJwe) ; — " bill 

 bright coral pink, whitish in the centre, brown on the culmen 

 and at tip of both mandibles" {Butler). 



The PLATE is by no means satisfactory ; the right hand figure 

 is intended to represent our present species. The face, sides of 

 the neck, and breast should be a rather pale blue grey instead of 

 the colour shown ; the whole of the spotting of the crown, nape, 

 and back of the neck is due to some mistake. These parts should 

 be unspotted chestnut red, like the streak shown in the plate 

 from behind the eye. It is only in the young bird that these 

 parts are mingled with brown, and then the brown is in long 

 streaks not spots. The white banding on the wings and mantle 

 is not sufficiently distinctly shown, and, varying as do the colours 

 of bills and feet, I doubt whether they are ever as depicted in 

 the plate. 



The NESTLING of this species has the whole upper surface black- 

 ish brown, the feathers of the back margined with brown ; the 

 chin, throat, and middle of the abdomen whitish ; the rest of the 

 lower surface chiefly fawny brown, with faint traces of white 

 barrings on the side of the abdomen ; the little wings are 

 like the back, except that they exhibit pale dots on either web 

 of the feathers — the first traces of the barrings that extend in the 

 adult bird over the entire wings and upper plumage. 



In this species the white barrings develop very rapidly, and 

 may be observed in comparatively quite young birds which have 

 not yet acquired a trace of rufous on the crown and neck, 



