WH1MBREL. 
141 
open moor, on or by some hillock, or low stump. A few 
dry grasses are the materials of its composition, and it is 
scarcely hid from view. 
The eggs are four in number, of a dark olive brown colour, 
blotted with darker brown. They are wide at one end, and 
much narrower at the other, and are placed in the nest 
with the pointed ends inwards. They are considered good 
eating, and being sought for on this account, the numbers of 
the birds are diminished in consequence. The male and 
female sit on them by turns. If disturbed from them they 
make great outcries to distract the intruder. The young 
leave the nest as soon almost as hatched, and quickly learn 
to skulk most warily on the approach of danger. 
Male; weight, about fourteen ounces; length, one foot four 
inches; bill, deep brownish black; pale brown, verging to red, 
at the base of the upper mandible. It is above three inches 
in length when the bird is fully adult. From its base to 
the eye is a dark brown streak; above it and over the eye 
is another light-coloured one; eye-brows, white, streaked with 
brown; iris, dark brown; eyelids, white. Forehead, brown; 
head on the crown, dark brown, with a light brown streak 
passing backwards, occasioned by the feathers being broadly 
margined with white; on the sides it is white, decked with 
brown thickly and broadly. Neck on the back and nape, 
dull brownish or ochreous white, with a dark streak on the 
centre of each feather; chin, white; throat and breast, pale 
brown, or greyish white above, on the sides, white, irregularly 
barred across with brown; below it is nearly white, the feather 
shafts being neatly streaked in a hair-like manner. Back 
above, brownish black, the feathers margined with white and 
ochreous white; on its lower part white. 
The wings have the first quill feather the longest. The 
axillary feathers are barred with brown. Greater and lesser 
wing coverts, dusky brown, with dull brownish white margins 
to the feathers; primaries, greyish dusky black; secondaries 
and tertiaries, dusky, barred with white. Tail, pale brownish 
white or grey, the centre feathers darker, and transversely 
barred with six or seven bars of a darker brown; the outside 
feathers graduate nearly to white; upper tail coverts, white, 
barred with dark brown; under tail coverts, nearly white, 
with brown longitudinal streaks. Legs and toes, bluish black 
or bluish grey; claws, black. 
The female has all the pale tints more ochreous. Length, 
