Some J'u/rjah Rioer I Urdu. 
41 
creaiu instead of white; tlio tiiroat and iipiwr breast ai'e m;irked 
with wedge -sha])ed black si)ots. 
The llight-l'catiiers and reel rices are moulted when the 
first winter })iuinage is assumed. As far as my obsei'vatioiis 
go (but J am not yet aljsolutcly cei'tain) the adult plumage 
is assumed at tlie first spring moult, and the first winter plum- 
age differs from the juvenile garb in that the upper pai'ts 
approximate more to those of the adult, Imt the loi'os, forehead,, 
and eyelids remain as before; the spots on the throat and 
breast become Aery small and few in number. (The departure 
of the species for' its winter' quarters has pj'evented me 
making certain of this phase). 
Nesting in company with the f"j-atincoles are often lo 
be found numbers of Indian River Terns {Sterna secna), and 
the Indian Scissor-bill or Skimmer {RJiynchops alhicollu) ; and 
when this is the case the invasion of the colony is an afiair 
productive of a great deaf of noise and excitement, for the 
two latter species usually advance to meet the intruder and 
fly round and about- all the time he is there, ultering their 
harsh cries ,and often mounting to a great height in the aii', 
so as to form a kind of background to tiie undercurrent of 
skimming, fluttering, churring. Pratincoles. 
The first occasion that I met with Rivei' Terns and 
Scissor -bills nesting together recalls an exciting experience. 
The colony was a large one, and the nests were more or less 
intermingled, so it was a problem how the eggs were to be 
assig-ned to their real owners, for the eggs of both species 
were previously unknown to me, and the birds rose from their 
nests at a distance. So I enlisted the services of a couple 
of brother officers with a view to making a night attack, in 
the hopes of catching the birds asleep on their nests. After 
dark we set forth with a lantern to visit the sand-bank. 
Since this was an island and there were no boats han.dy it 
meanti wadhig; the channel was a broad one, and the water 
fairly deep and very cold, as the Himalayan snows were be- 
ginning to melt. As promoter of the expedition i had the 
dubous honour of leading — it was a somewhat risky Job^-- 
with a rushing current nearly up to one's waist, a pitch black 
night with the light of a single lantern lighting up the im- 
mediate surface of the waters ,and total uncertainty as to when 
I should fall into one of the deeper holes in the river bed; 
