somewhat tinged with ochraceous exteriorly | the under tail-
coverts are white, blackish along thé shafts, and more' or less
varied with black in different specimens, which also vary considerably
as to the size and shape of all the spots, being in some
•more acute, in others more • rounded, &c< The wings are eight
inches long, thé third and fourth primaries being the longest;
the scapulars are uniform with the back, but herides,the rusty
sprinkling of the margins and tip, the largest have narrow bandlike
spots of a pure bright rufous* a slight whitish streak along
the shaft in the centre, and a large white spot at the end. The
smaller- wing-coverts are plain chocolate brown; the spurious
wing, and outer* coverts, are of the same brown* but each feather
hears at the point a large and very conspicuous pure white spot;
all the other.superior coverts are blackish, sprinkled and banded
with rusty, each furnished with a conspicuous terminal spot; the
under wing-coverts, together with the long axillary feathers, are
pure white* each with a single'small dusky spot, and are marbled
with white and brownish on the outer margin; the quills are plain
dusky brown, the primaries being regularly marked with pure
white spots half an inch apart f n their outer webs,; except at: the
point of the first-; the- longest feather of the spurious wing, and
the larger outer coverts .have also a pair of these spots-: the
secondaries, besides the outer spots, which assume the appearance
of bands, are tipped with pure white, forming a narrow terminal
margin, those Nearest the tertials are also slightly marked with
rusty; the tertials themselves, are similar to the scapulars, that
is, they are black, banded and sprinkled with, different shades of
rusty. The -tail is strongiy cuneiform and graduated, of eighteen
feathers, with the middle five »inches long, which is three more
than the outer. According to some accounts, the two middle
feathers are by « r e than two inches longer than the adjoining,
but in all we have examined the difference was little more than
an inch. The four middle are similar in shape, texture, and
colour, being narrow, flaccid, equal in breadth throughout, though
somewhat dilated and cut square at the end. In colour they vary
considerably in different specimens, the ground being generally
black, and fh# tips white, but more or less yaried* in some with
white and in others with rusty, these colours being at one time
pure, at another sprinkled with blackish, and- assuming various
tints; in one .specimen they are disposed in spots, in another in
bands, linos, chains, angles, but generally in a long stripe on
each- side of the shaft, at base, and in transverse spots at the
point of the two longest, while they’ are in round spots all along
each side of the .two-'shortest: in one;#p®#iti6.ehiiiteld|têr-'arer;éVe)i
almost .plain, being dingy -white; sprinkled with blackish on th e
whole of their outer Web: all the other lateral feathers, entirely
concealed by the ^eOvertSs wre pure white at the point, but with
dusky shafts, and are more or less broadly dark cinereous, at
base*: these feathers'are very rigid, and of a curious form, tapering
from the base to the point, where they Suddenly dilate; they are
deeply emarginate at tip, and their inner lobe projects considerably*
Iqng; the.slender hair-like feathers
covering it are, as Well as the femorajs,.of a dingy grayish white,
obsoletely waved with dusky; the toes are.": strongly, pectinated,
and are, as well as the nails, ®f a. blackish dusky, while the long
processes are whitish.
The/foregoing minute description is chiefly taken from a handsome
male, specimen from ArGtic America. There is no difference
between the sexes, at least we have not been able to detect any
in all the specimens of both that we have examined: hence we
conclude that the difference generally described by authors, and
which we have ourselves copied in our Synopsis, that of the breast
being chocolate brown in the male, and uniform with the rest of
the plumage in the female, does npt exist. The female is merely