THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
as a gigantic Snipe with a Woodcock’s bill. It is surpassed in size by 
the Brazilian bird named Gallinago gigantea Temminck, and from an 
examination of the birds of the two species preserved in the British 
Museum, it would seem that the typical Cayenne bird, undulata of 
Boddaert, has become larger the farther it travelled south. Thus while 
Cayenne birds measure — culmen 101-106, wing 155-160, metatarsus 47-48, 
Brazilian birds show culmen 117, wing 170, metatarsus 55. Argentine 
birds give culmen 124-133, wing 175-177, metatarsus 55-56. The genus 
is pecuharly well-marked by its hugh size, strictly gaUinagine legs and 
feet with exposed tibia, typically rusticoline biU, and absolutely gaUinagine 
coloration. It can be compared with nothing, as the rusticoline biU is 
distinctive among the typicaUy gaUinagine coloured birds. Its co-existence 
alongside such a smaU typical galUnagine bird as 0. hrasiliensis Swain. 
{z=:G. frenata Auct.) is of much interest, as it points to the great antiquity 
of the coloration and consequent high value of a colour-alteration. The 
meaning of this strange medley of Snipe-Woodcock birds in South America 
wiU take a great deal of unraveUing, especiaUy as we have no stationary 
form at all in Australia, the two species here treated being simply migrants 
from Siberia. According to the British Museum CoUection, Hmnoptilura 
gigantea Temm. lays a typical Woodcock’s egg. 
I have now criticised the species included by Seebohm in his Wood- 
cocks and semi-Woodcocks, and come to the species he termed Aberrant 
Snipes. Two of these show distinctive coloration and can be treated first. 
G. nemoricola Hodgson is typicaUy gaUinagine in everything save its biU 
which, though galUnagine in character, is deep at the base like a rusticoline 
biU. The metatarsus is comparatively long whUe the wing is normaUy short. 
Hodgson’s genus-name Nemoricola, of course, given to this species alone, is 
avaUable and should be used. 
The other distinctly coloured species is Hodgson’s S. soUtaria, and the 
combination of characters shown by it makes it stand weU apart from aU the 
other Aberrant Snipes. The metatarsus is regularly rusticoline as is also the 
hind toe and claw, while the biU is more gaUinagine in character. The wing 
and biU are proportionaUy very long, while the metatarsus is typicaUy rusti- 
coline in its shortness. The taU is composed of eighteen feathers of which the 
outer ones are short and attenuated, the middle ten being broad and forming 
a regular rounded tail, while four on each side are much shorter and narrower. 
The bill is less than half the wing but more than twice the metatarsus. Though 
Seebohm and Sharpe have given this species as the type of Spilura Bonaparte, 
I have shown that this was an incorrect citation and that stenura was noted 
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