Page:Stray feathers. Journal of ornithology for India and its dependencies (IA strayfeathersjou11873hume).pdf/46

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The Wagtails cf India. conceal entirely (as they do in Personata), the brown portions of the feathers.

In the breeding" plumag'e the males and females of Personafa are nndistinguishable^ except that in the males the wings vary from 3 "6 to '6 1 inches, while in the females they seem to vary from 3'4' to 3*55 inches. As regards Duhhunensis, the same may be the case; but it is curious that I have no female Dickhmensis of my own collecting-, or of which the sex has been authenticated by a really careful and reliable observer, in the same full breeding plumag'e as the males. In Alba the female has always much less black upan the occiput, and the chin and throat are a duller and browner black, and the same difference somewhat exagg-erated may exist in the race we designate Luk/mnensis.

In winter, both Personata and Dtekhunensis entirely Jose in both sexes the black of the head, which is replaced in the male by a dark, in the female, by a lighter grey.

The black of the chin, throat, and breast is reduced in BuJcImnensin to a moderately broad, more or less cresceutic pectoral band, with two ill-defined broken blackish stripes running up the sides of the neck as it were from the points of the crescent, which stripes, never I think entirely disappear, though in some specimens they become neai-ly obsolete ; the broad white frontal band remains unchanged in width or nearly so in the adult male, though its color is less pure ; but in the female, it is gveatly diminished in width so as in some specimens to become almost obsolete, while in all specimens it is more or less overlaid with sordid grey

In Personata, on the other hand, the whole breast alwaifs remains, black, and though the chin and upper part of the throat are white, the lower part of the throat is still more or less speckled with black. In the perfect winter plumage of both species the amount of the black on the breast, sides of the neek, and throat at once serve to distinguish the two species, but specimens of Buhhmemis changing into winter plumage often (so far as the amount of black on the throat and breast is eoneemed) exactly resemble the perfect winter plumage of Personata, and the only ready and unfailing diagnosis of the two species is that in both sexes, and at all seasons, the ear- coverts and whole aural region are in Personata black, blackish or dark grey ; in Diokhunensis, pure white or greyish or sordid white. This marked difference coupled with the conspicuously greater amount of white on the wings of Personata as compared with those of Pukh'itnensis ought to render the separation of any specinjiens of the two species comparatively easy.