46 
SHARP-TAILED GROUS. 
nearly whitish, but almost similar in shape, markings, and texture, 
to the longest; the lateral decrease in size very fast from the 
centre, but by regular degrees, and are remarkably stiff, somewhat 
like those of Woodpeckers, wider at base and tip than in the 
middle, pure white at the end and on the inner web, the shaft 
black, and the outer web dotted with blackish; they are deeply 
emarginate at tip, the inner lobe being longer, acute, and singularly 
shaped. 
