THE ANDAMANESE BANDED RAIL. 255 



assumes the characteristic white bandings of the upper surface 

 some months later than does the Continental species. 



The following is a description of a nearly full-grown Andama- 

 nese bird, the colours of which closely resemble those of the 

 nestling of the Continental form : — 



Forehead, crown, occiput, back of neck, entire back, rump 

 and upper tail-coverts black or deep blackish brown, the feathers 

 very narrowly margined laterally with dull olive brown ; scapu- 

 lars similar, but most of them with a minute brownish white 

 speck on the outer (and in some few on both) webs near the tip; 

 chin and throat, as far as the end of the maxilla, white ; rest of 

 the throat, lores, entire sides of head and neck, and breast a 

 uniform very dark grey-brown, or deep leaden grey with a 

 brownish tinge ; wings and tail black, with narrow white bars, 

 in many cases reduced to spots, on both webs ; the coverts, secon- 

 daries and tertiaries margined with dull olive brown, as in the 

 case of the back feathers, and in the case of the quills, with the 

 outer webs, between the white bars, with more or less of an olive 

 tinge, not reaching in any case either to the bars or the shafts ; 

 abdomen, vent, lower tail-coverts, sides and flanks, dull dusky 

 olive brown, obscurely barred with brownish white, the white 

 more or less bounded above and below with blackish ; lower 

 surface of the wing blackish, more or less banded with white. 



There are many other species of Banded Rails (Hypotcznidioi) 

 distributed through the Islands of the Archipelago, Australia, 

 New Zealand, and the Islands of the South Pacific, but none, so 

 far as I know, from the mainland of Asia or elsewhere. They 

 are mostly very migratory species, but I cannot ascertain that 

 either striata in India or obscuriora in the Andamans are 

 at all migratory. 



