Their flight is weak, and seldom sustained for more than fifty yards.”
Mr. F. A. Barratt mentions one specimen procured in the Lydenburg
district, and the late Mr. Frank Oates records one from Tati in
the Matabele country, while a single specimen was obtained by
Mr. Jameson's expedition at Palatswie Pan in December.
All the feathers on the upper parts of the plumage, dark-brown,
edged with pale-ferruginous; wing-coverts and quills, deep-chestnut;
fore-parts of neck and breast, pale-cinereous; belly yellowish-
white ; sides, thighs, and vent, rufous, marked with white bars.
Length, 9 |" ; wing, 5^"; tail, 1" 5"'.
Fig. Dresser, B. Eur. vii. pi. 499.
588. C r ex eg reg ia (Peters). Greater African Crake.
A single specimen of this bird was killed in Natal and sent to us
by Mr. Windham. Mr. Ayres has met with one specimen in the
Transvaal, shot “ whilst trying for Snipe in a marsh close by
Potchefstroom. It must be exceedingly rare here.” Mr. Frank
Oates obtained the species at Gubuleweyo; “ shot in marsh by
‘ Spruit,' December 26th, 1873.” Professor Barboza duBocage has
only recorded it from localities to the north of the Quanza.
Feathers of the upper parts black, with a broad border of brown,
giving the bird a scaled appearance; markings on the head very
minute; line from bill over the eye white; cheeks and sides of head
grey ; chin and throat white; chest grey; sides of the same greenish,
rest of under parts barred black and white. Length, 7" 6"'; wing,
4" 8"'; tail, 1" 3"'. “ Irides orange, eyelids bright red ; bill pale
bluish horn-colour, dusky on the ridge, and pale at the base of the
under mandible ; tarsi and feet dusky pale ” (Ayres).
589. C rex marginal is (Rartl.). Olive-margined Crake.
Mr. Andersson has recorded five instances in which he procured
this bird in February and March, 1867, at Ondonga, in Ovampo
Land. The eggs were brought to him on the 23rd of February;
they were of a yellowish ground colour, almost hidden near the
thicker end by a broad zone of light brownish red. On the 1st of
March he himself found a nest containing four eggs, situated just on
the edge of a marsh in a dry tuft of grass. Two of Mr. Andersson’s
specimens were sent home in his last collection, one of which is now
in the Leiden Museum, where it was examined by Mr. J. H. Gurney,
who refers it to the present species, which was hitherto known only
from Gaboon. . .
The following is a translation of Dr. Hartlaub’s ongma
description.
Above blackish, the feathers margined with olive with a white
lateral edge; head grey; under surface of body ashy; the throat
and abdomen whitish; vent and under tail-coverts pale rufous;
under wing-coverts ashy, varied with whitish. Total length, 7 | ,
bill, 8'"; wing, 3" 10"'; tarsus, 13"'; middle toe, 1" 10"'. Mr. Andersson
gives the soft parts as f o l l ows Th e iris is brown tinged with
reddish yellow; the eyelid yellow; the basal part of the bill green,
merging into bluish at the extremity; the ridge of the upper
mandible dark brown; legs and feet dusky green with a slight
bluish tint on the upper portion of the uncovered part of the
tibia.”
590. P orzana PORZANA (L.). Spotted Crake.
This European species has to our knowledge occurred but once
within our limits, Captain Shelley having recorded one specimen as
obtained by Mr. Jameson's expedition at Selenia Pan on the 29th
of December, and Mr. Ayres a d d s “ This is a rare bird in all parts
of South Africa I have visited.”
The large size of this species as compared with Baillon's Crake
ought to distinguish it at once, but in order to identify it clearly we
give a copy of the description given by Mr. Dresser in his “ Birds of
Europe.”
Adult male.— Forehead, crown, sides of the face, chin and upper
throat deep blackish slate-grey, the throat and head m front of the
eyes unspotted ; crown closely marked with black and dark reddish
brown; lores and feathers at the base of the bill nearly black;
nape, hind neck, and upper parts generally dark reddish brown with
an olivaceous tinge, on the neck closely dotted with white, and on
the rest of the upper parts marked with short stripes and spots
of white and tolerably regularly blotched with black; quills and
tail olivaceous brown, the first primary externally narrowly
margined with white; under parts deep slate-grey, the centre
of the abdomen nearly white, the breast spotted, and the flanks
spotted and barred with white; under tail-coverts warm ochreous