( 530 ) 



miuor, and reaches from Siberia eastwards to Rnssia. It seems as if it gets smaller 

 again in Eastern Siberia, on the Amur, and there makes a slight effort to approach 

 1). m. japonicus. 



10. Dendrocopns major kamtschaticus (Dyb.). 



Forehead pale buff, underside of the purest white, lateral rectrices pure white or 

 with a few tiny black spots towards the tip. Bill rather elongated. 



Kamtschatka. 



This bird has first been named Pictis m'ljor kamtsckaticus by Dybowski in 

 Bull. Soc. Zool. France, 1883, p. 368. The tiuotation in the Gat. B. Brit. Mas. 

 XVIII. p. 214 is wrong, and Taczanowski {Faune Orn. Sib. Orient. II. p. 717) 

 quotes " kamtschatkensis " instead of kamtschalicus. Stejneger afterwards named 

 the bird Dendrocopiis purus. D. m. cissa and kamtschaticus are erroneously 

 lumped in the C'atalogne of Birds. 



11. Dendrocopus major japonicus (Seebohm). 



Differs from D. major major in having the frontal band and undersurface more 

 brownish buff, and in having the white bars on the wings regularly continued across 

 the innermost secondaries. The dimensions are less. The young are striped on the 

 sides of the chest, and cross-barred on the lower abdomen, but this peculiarity is 

 also sometimes observed, though in a lesser degree, in European examples of major. 



Japan and Kurile Islands. 



12. Dendrocopus major syriacus (Hempr. & Ehrb.). 



In this form the black line behind the ear-coverts is absent. It is a small form, 

 and the lateral rectrices are black with only a white tip and one additional white 

 bar. The immature bird has blackish striatious to the flanks and sides of the chest 

 and a red crescent across the chest I 



Although separated in tlie Cat. B. Brit. Mm. from D. major and its allies by 

 such widely different species as />. cathpharius, pi/rrhothorax and pernyi, I believe 

 that syriactis also belongs to the major group, representing it in parts of Asia Minor, 

 Palestine and Western Persia, although another form of D. major, perhaps 

 separable, perhaps not from D. major major or its Central and South-eastern 

 European forms, occurs also in parts of Asia Minor. Anyhow, these forms require 

 more attention and study. 



13. Dendrocopus major scindeanus (Horsf. & Moore). 



If syriacus is admitted, 1 think the small scindeanus must also be put in the 

 same group. 



I believe that further also 



Dendrocopus cabanisi (Malh.) 

 from China, and 



Dendrocopus himalayensis (Jard.) 



from Cashmere, etc., can be regarded as forms of 7>. major, and that with these 

 the subspecies of this widely spread old-world group are finished, as far as they 

 are at present known. 



