192 



NEW ORNITHOLOGY OF NEPAL. 



Wagtails to the Threshes ; and it is well worthy of notice that the two 

 former have wings of exactly the same construction. 



With regard to Budytes, much as its lark-like claws prepare us to 

 expect some peculiarity of manners, I have failed thus far to perceive any, 

 as compared with Motacilla proper.* 



In place of the ' unguis posticus arcuatus of the generic character, I 

 should read ' nails (all) straightened, slender, very acute : the hind one 

 equal to its digit or longer ?' 



In our Daliila, also, the nails are acute ; but they are strong and curved ; 

 and the very slight but perceptible depression or tiatness of the soles of the 

 feet distinctly indicates the perching and meruline propensity of Dakila. 



The bill of Daliila, as compared with that of Turdus, is scarcely so 

 thick, rather more depressed at the base, and rather less convex forwards 

 upon the ridge ; and the tip of its lower mandible shows evanescently the 

 recurvation and notch so conspicuous in many of the iawc«V/«?, and distinct 

 though fainter in some of the Muscicapidse and even of the Sylviadw. But 

 these distinctions are all nice ; and the general and effectual character of 

 the bill of Daliila is Turdine. So too that of the legs, though here the 

 superior height and strength of the tarsi with the depression of the thumb, 

 and acuteness of the nails, are palpable distinctions. I have not noticed in 

 either Motacilla or Turcliis, the nuchal hairs of Daliila, and which with the 

 strength of the tarsi seem to intimate a Crateropine tendency in our genus, 

 harmonising well the shortened wings and gradated tail of Daliila, as 

 compared with the genera to which it is related by affinity » 



Nepal, Sept. 1836. 



* Thus much however may be said with truth ; that the short-clawed Wagtails often fre- 

 quent lawns and meadows ; the long-clawed, seldom or never ; and that the foot of the latter is 

 admirably suited to support the birds upon the most yielding and semi-Huid sand-banks, or 

 the precise situations to which they are almost limited. 



