Annals of the Transvaal Museum 
259 
These are all streaked on the head and upper surface generally — 
-except the rump — with broader and richer coloured margins than in the 
adults in summer plumage. The juvenile specimens collected in February 
and March are yellowish on the throat, breast, and flanks, this colour 
apparently changing to whitish on the breast and throat, and rufous on 
the flanks before the winter months ; the youngest specimens are the 
yellowest. 
In a wild state these birds are not easily distinguished from Hemvpteryx 
which frequents the same localities, and I am unable, therefore, to give 
much information about them ; but their nests are quite distinct, being 
truly cisticoline in shape and composition ; they are placed in a tuft of 
.grass (usually on one side) in the open veld. The eggs vary a good deal 
in colour, and measure 15-16 • 3 x 11-11 -6 mm. 
Group XIII — Cisticola lavendulae. 
(1) Tail in summer 70-75 %, in winter 80-85 % length of wing ; (2) 
first primary 28-36 % length of second ; (3) tail narrow and stiff ; (4) beak 
strong, but narrow and sharply pointed, equal in length to middle toe 
and half the claw ; (5) inner toe slightly longer than outer, its claw not 
extending beyond base of middle claw ; (6) middle claw weak, less than 
lialf the length of toe ; (7) seasonal change not so marked as in C. terrestris. 
Inhabits open veld in barren country. 
Cisticola lavendulae , Gr. and Reid.* 
The types of this species were collected in Somaliland, but since its 
discovery it has been recorded from German East Africa, Damaraland, 
and the Transvaal. Male specimens from the Transvaal appear to be some- 
what larger than the type, measuring from 110 to 118 mm. in the flesh, 
that of the type being given as 106 mm. 
The original description is short, and I am therefore giving the following, 
taken from an adult male in breeding plumage collected at Wolmaransstad 
on 25th November 
Crown light brown, centres of feathers darkest and the margins paler, 
producing a faintly streaked appearance ; forehead uniform and more 
tawny coloured than the crown ; hindneck much paler than the head, 
almost white in parts ; back like the crown, but more broadly margined 
with dull white ; plumes of the lower back and rump pale tawny rufous ; 
upper tail-coverts and middle tail feathers dark brown with paler margins ; 
Test of tail feathers, seen from above, darker brown with broad 
white tips, the white on the outermost extending round the 
outer web as well ; seen from below, the tail feathers are dark 
grey-brown, faintly and irregularly rayed with darker brown, often 
lorming a tolerably distinct subterminal patch ; the white tips to 
the tail feathers measure 3-4 mm. Upper lores and eyebrow white, 
the latter narrow but distinct ; a blackish spot before the eye, produced 
by all the bristles on the lower lores being tipped with blackish ; ear- 
uoverts like the hindneck ; throat, chin, cheeks, and under surface of body 
* Ibis, 1901, p. 650. 
