56 



BROWN STARLING. 



and compressed near the end, of a dusky colour, lightest at the base ; upper 

 mandible rather the longest, serrated within along- the middle of the 

 roof ; both mandibles punctured or rough near the tip ; irides dusky. 

 From the bill to the eye a dusky stroke, above that, passing over the 

 eye, a white one ; cheeks and throat white, with a few brown streaks 

 on the former ; upper and under eyelids white ; the crown of the head 

 and neck cinereous brown, lightest on the fore part of the latter, and 

 on the former the feathers are dusky in the middle ; back and scapulars 

 dark brown, margined with cinereous and rufous-brown ; greater quills 

 dusky, the interior ones, and the largest coverts immediately impending 

 them, slightly tipped with white ; shaft of the first quill white, the 

 second grey ; the smaller coverts above and just below the bastard wing 

 dusky and white ; the rest of the coverts cinereous-brown, darkest in 

 the middle of each feather ; the secondary quills dusky brown, tipped 

 and margined with white ; tertials cinereous-brown, darkest towards 

 the end, and pale at the edges ; upper breast like the fore part of the 

 neck, darker down the shafts ; lower breast and belly white ; under 

 wing coverts and under scapulars white, prettily marked with angular 

 dusky streaks ; thighs faintly spotted the same ; lower part of the back 

 under the scapulars white; rump and upper tail coverts elegantly 

 barred with black and white ; those on the former, in form of sublunated 

 black spots ; under tail coverts reach nearly to the end of the tail, 

 which, with the sides of the vent, are rufous-white, barred with dusky ; 

 the same markings, but fainter, extend along the sides under the wing ; 

 the tail consists of twelve somewhat pointed feathers, all thickly barred 

 with black and white on both webs, the black bars much the broadest ; 

 the two middle feathers rather the longest, a little tinged with ferru- 

 ginous at the tip ; legs yellow olivaceous-green. 



The bird here described is a male, and was shot in the beginning of 

 October on the coast of Devonshire. It seems to vary so little in the 

 essential characters from the Brown Snipe described by Mr. Pennant 

 and Dr. Latham, that we cannot hesitate to pronounce it a variety of 

 that bird. It has not to our knowledge been noticed before as a British 

 species, and has only been found in America, on the coast of New York. 



BROWN STARLING or Solitary Thrush {Turdus solitarius, La- 

 tham.) — *Much confusion appears to exist with respect to this bird, 

 adding a strong proof among many others of the opinion of Temminck, 

 " that there are few genera of the old passerines which contain a greater 

 number of species badly arranged, than those of Latham's Sturnus and 

 Turdus. Montagu, in his Supplement, describes a bird under the name 



