Page:Transactions of the Natural History Society of Northumberland, Durham, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne 1838 Vol.2.djvu/310

274 Mr. Selby's Account of Two Rare British Birds. colour; at the posterior angle of the eye, a streak of darker brown. Forehead, white, the shafts of some of the feathers brown; auriculars, light chesnut brown, with darker shafts. The rest of the head, throat, and neck, white tinged with cream yellow, some of the feathers having a dark streak down their centres. Back and wing coverts, with the basal half of the feathers, pure white; the exposed or visible part, amber brown, with paler margins. Greater quills, black, barred with white towards the base; their extreme tips, also white. Tail, hair brown, with four bars of a deeper colour, the intermediate spaces also irregularly barred with dark hair brown; the tips of the feathers white-Breast and under plumage, cream white, with lanceolate streaks of dark brown, largest upon the abdomen and thighs. Legs, short and strong, saffron yellow; the claws but little hooked, and black.

The other is a figure of the , contrasted with that of the common species, and taken from a specimen that was shot at, near , on the , and kindly sent to me by Mr. John Jackson, of that town, in the fresh state. This is the third instance only upon record of the capture of this rare and curiously marked species. The first having been killed in, Ireland, and which, fortunately for science, fell into the hands of Mr. Vigors, who described it as a new species, in the Transactions of the Linnean Society, vol. xiv.; the other was taken a year or two afterwards upon the Medway, near to , in Kent. In the colours and disposition of the plumage, the present individual accords in every particular with the two just mentioned, possessing the same deep saturated plumage, and agreeing with them in the relative proportions of its various parts. In size it nearly equals the common Snipe, but is thicker and rounder in form, and its legs considerably shorter in proportion. The colours are also so disposed, and the form of the feathers of the back and scapulars are such, as to discountenance any idea of its being a variety of the Common Snipe, and equally so of our other acknowledged species, the and. The following is a description taken previous to dissection :— Length from the tip of the bill to the end of the tail, ten inches and a quarter; length of