310 A PRACTICAL HANDBOOK OF BRITISH BIRDS. 



Description. — Adult male. Winter and summer. — Fore-head and 

 crest cinnamon-rufous shading to paler on hinder- crown ; nape 

 and upper-mantle dull black ; mantle and scapulars drab, lowest 

 scapulars mouse-grey ; broad white crescentic patch across base 

 of scapulars ; back drab, lower-back, rump and upper tail-coverts 

 black glossed dull green (in some long tail-coverts drab) ; rest of 

 head and neck pinkish-vinaceous, lower-neck all round black ; 

 patch on sides of breast and belly white, feathers usually tipped or 

 finely vermiculated dusky ; sides of body and flanks drab inter- 

 mixed with white feathers more or less freckled dusky and some- 

 times tipped drab ; rest of under-parts black, sometimes brown- 

 black ; axillaries and under wing -coverts white ; tail-feathers drab- 

 grey, outer ones with inner webs paler or more or less white ; 

 primaries hair-brown, inner webs and inner primaries except at tip, 

 white suffused pale drab ; secondaries white suffused pale drab 

 with a subterminal hair -brown band and white tip, inner ones drab- 

 grey, innermost drab ; primary- coverts and bastard-wing hair- 

 brown ; lesser primary- coverts white ; rest of wing-coverts light 

 drab ; lesser coverts bordering edge and bend of wing white. No 

 moulting birds examined. 



Adult male. Eclipse. — (Not examined.) 



Adult female. Winter and summer. — Fore-head, crown, crest, 

 and side of head to level with eye cinnamon- brown, crest much less 

 developed than in male ; nape and mantle drab-brown ; scapulars and 

 upper tail-coverts yellowish -drab or buff -brown, lower scapulars, 

 back and rump olive-brown ; lores, cheeks, chin, throat and rest of 

 neck greyish-white ; feathers of upper-breast drab fringed yellowish- 

 white ; feathers of sides of body and flanks yellowish -drab fringed 

 white ; feathers of rest of under-parts pale drab -grey fringed ashy- 

 white ; lower under tail- coverts, axillaries, and most under wing- 

 coverts white ; tail and wing as in male, but white of primaries and 

 secondaries washed palest drab and lesser coverts bordering edge 

 of wing ashy- white. N.B. — No spring material examined and only 

 summer birds seen (one May, one June in Tring Mus.) were in worn 

 plumage and possibly birds of previous year. 



Nestling. — Crown, nape, upper-parts and sides of body sepia, 

 down with long greenish-golden tips ; bar across wing, patch on 

 either side of back and another on either side of base of uropygial 

 tuft, pale yellow ; ill-defined sepia streak through eye ; cheeks, 

 sides of neck and remaining under-parts pale yellow, shading to 

 greyish-white on belly, vent, and under tail-coverts ; down round 

 tarsus and extending slightly on to vent sepia. 



Juvenile. Male. — -Apparently like adult female but only sexed 

 specimen examined had partially acquired first winter-summer 

 plumage on head and neck. Feathers of under-parts smaller than 

 in adult female and drab -grey with yellowish -white or white tips, 

 drab-grey bases only partially concealed giving under-parts a mot- 

 tled appearance as in juvenile N. f. ferina ; tail-feathers very worn 

 but apparently coloration as in adult, tips square with bare shaft 



