6o 
ALLEN’S naturalist’s LIBRARY. 
Adult Male. — General colour above light brown, the scapulars 
tipped with buffy-white and crossed with a band of buff, which 
is broadly edged with black ; rump white ; primaries black, 
with a broad band of white, in the form of a spot on the inner 
web of the first primary, and again on the eighth, ninth, and 
tenth, where the white bar takes the form of a transverse spot; 
the external aspect of the wing barred with black and white ; 
head and neck pale vinous-rufous, including the crest, which 
is a little darker; the crest-feathers tijiped with black, before 
which is a sub-terminal bar, before which, again, is a bar of 
white, not defined on its junction with the rufous of the rest of 
the feather ; throat and breast also vinous-rufous, the abdomen 
very pale buff; flank-feathers streaked with blackish along 
their inner webs ; under tail-coverts white ; tail black, with a 
median white bar, which crosses the other feathers diagonally, 
so as to approach the tip on the outermost pair. Bill blackish, 
flesh-coloured at the base of both mandibles ; feet black ; iris 
brown. Total length, 12 inches; culmen, 2‘2 ; wing, 57 ; tail, 
4'o ; tarsus, o'8. 
Adult Female — Similar to the male. 
Young,— Like the adults, but a little duller and browner in 
colour. 
Eange in Great Britain. — The Hoopoe may be considered a 
regular spring migrant, and it has occurred in nearly every 
part of the United Kingdom, including the Orkney and Shet- 
land Isles, as well as the outer Hebrides. If the bird were 
not so conspicuous an object and so tame, it is almost certain 
that it would nest regularly in England, and, notwithstanding 
the fact that a Hoopoe is almost sure to be shot by way of 
welcome in this country, there is no doubt that it has bred in 
many of the southern counties of England. 
Eange outside tlie British Islands. — Generally distributed through- 
out Southern Europe, and nesting in the Mediterranean coun- 
tries, and in Central Europe as far north as Denmark and 
Southern Sweden. It wanders even to the Fteroes and Spits- 
bergen, and the North of Russia and Norway, but does not 
breed in these high latitudes. Its eastern range extends through- 
out Central Asia to China and Japan. It arrives in the south 
of Europe in the middle of February, and Colonel Irby notes 
