153 
Allen’s naturalist’s library. 
open flats and grass-lands, where they are found in flocks of 
from six to twenty in number. They run with great swiftness, 
and have much the appearance of Burchell’s Courser, accord- 
ing to Mr. Ayres, who also says that when they rise, their 
flight resembles that of a Pratincole, and they utter much the 
same stridulous note of alarm. Their food consists principally 
of beetles and other small insects, on which they become very 
fat. 
THE BLACK-BREASTED DOTTERELS. GENUS EUDROMIAS. 
Eudromias, Brehm, Vog. Deutschl. p. 544 (1831). 
Type, E. morinellus (Linn.). 
The single representative of this genus is a more heavily- 
built bird than the species of Aigialiiis and Oxyechtcs, but it 
has the shorter bill of the latter birds, and holds an intermediate 
position between them and the species of Ochthodromus. Its 
peculiar coloration in the full plumage, and its comparatively 
shorter tarsi distinguish it, and the bare part of the tibia is not 
so extended as in the genus JEgialitis. 
I. THE dotterel. EUDROMIAS MORINELLUS. 
Charadrms morinellus, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 254 (1766); See- 
bohm, Brit. B. p. 30, pi. 26, figs. 1-3 (1885). 
Eudromias morinellus, Dresser, B. Eur. vii. p. 507, pi. 526 
(187s) ; B. O. U. List Brit. B. p. 160 (1883) ; Saunders, 
ed. Yarr. Brit. B. iii. p. 246 (1883) j id. Man. Brit. B. p. 
521 (1889); Sharpe, Cat. B. Brit. Mus. xxiv. p. 234. 
Adult Male. — General colour above ashy-brown, streaked with 
sandy-buff, the feathers being edged with this colour ; wing- 
coverts like the back, and edged with sandy-buff ; bastard- 
wing, primary-coverts, and quills dusky-brown ; the first pri- 
mary with a white shaft and white outer web; rest of the 
primaries blackish along the outer web and at the ends, the 
secondaries fringed with whitish, the innermost edged with 
sandy-buff, and resembling the back ; crown of head blackish- 
brown, slightly varied with sandy-buff margins to the feathers ; 
