Common Characters. Brownish-gray above, paler, and with a vinaceous cast anteriorly, beneath. Each feather with a terminal dusky crescentic bar, producing a squamate appearance; inner webs of quills chestnut; axillars black; about terminal half of three outer tail-feathers white.

S. squamosa.[109] A white patch on the wing-coverts and secondaries; abdomen and crissum white. Black crescentic bars very heavy. Wing, 3.90; tail, 4.10. Hab. Brazil, Ecuador.

S. inca. No white patch on wings; abdomen and crissum pale ochraceous. Black bars very faint on breast, obsolete on throat. Wing, 3.75; tail, 4.40. Hab. Mexico and Guatemala; Rio Grande of Texas.

Scardafella inca, Bonap.
SCALY DOVE.

Scardafella inca, (Bonap.) Scl. P. Z. S. 1859, 391.—Reichenb. Handb. 19, tab. 250, f. 1393; tab. 253, f. 1410.—Elliot, Illust. II, pl. xxxvii.—Coop. Orn. Cal. I, 1870, 519. Scardafella squamosa (“Temm.”) Wagl. Isis, 1831, 519 (not of Temminck!).—Baird, Birds N. Am. 1858, 605.

Sp. Char. Above ashy-brown, becoming purer and lighter ashy on the wings. Beneath pale ashy-lilaceous, with a pinkish tinge anteriorly, becoming pale ochraceous on the abdomen, tibiæ, and crissum. Outer webs and ends of primaries, and tail-feathers (except the intermediæ), dusky. Every feather (except rectrices and primaries) terminated with a crescentic bar of dusky; these bars heaviest on the mantle, upper tail-coverts, and on the sides and flanks, faintest on the jugulum, obsolete on throat. Primaries and lining of wing mostly deep chestnut; axillars black; lateral tail-feather with the terminal half white, on both webs; second and third feathers with a gradually decreasing amount of white. Sexes similar. Young similar, but feathers faintly mottled, and markings less sharply defined. Wing, 3.75; tail, 4.40; culmen, .47; tarsus, .57; middle toe, .58. Female a little smaller.

Hab. Rio Grande Valley, south to Guatemala. Arizona (Tucson, Bendire); Oaxaca (Scl. 1859, 391, eggs); Cordova (1856, 309); Guatemala (Ibis I, 223); Honduras (Taylor, Ibis, II, 227); City of Mexico (Scl. P. Z. S. 1864, 178.)

Scardafella inca.

Specimens from Nicaragua to Texas and Mazatlan do not vary appreciably.