These remarkable birds have very long toes, which enable them to run about on the large floating leaves of water plants.
[181]. Metopidius indicus: The Bronze-winged Jaçana. (F. 1428), (J. 900), (-IV.)
Head, neck, and breast a beautiful glossy black. A conspicuous white eyebrow. There is some black in the wings, but the general hue of these is a metallic greenish bronze. The lower back and tail are chestnut red.
Rare in Western India; common in the east.
“They present,” writes Cunningham, “an odd appearance on the wing, owing to the disproportionate size of their feet, which becomes particularly conspicuous when the legs are dropped just before the bird pitches on the surface of the weeds and expands its toes, which have been gathered up into a bundle during flight.”
[182]. Hydrophasianus chirurgus: The Pheasant-tailed Jaçana. (F. 1429), (J. 901), (IV, but with a tail a foot in length in the breeding season.)
Winter plumage: Upper parts brown, with a conspicuous white eyebrow and a yellow band down each side of the neck. Wings black and white. Lower parts white with a black gorget across the breast. Tail feathers white, except the two median ones, which are brown.
Breeding plumage: A long black pheasant-like tail is assumed, and the other parts are black, save the head, throat, and wings, which are white, and the back of the neck, which is golden yellow. This Jaçana looks in breeding plumage (i.e. in the summer) rather like a silver pheasant, and, indeed, Europeans call it the water-pheasant. It is a beautiful creature in its summer splendour. Finn says that it is to his mind “the most beautiful of all our smaller aquatic birds, and hardly equalled in this respect by any bird whatever.”
Its peculiar wailing cry has been likened to the mew of a kitten.