NOVTTATES ZOOLOCICAE XXVT. 1919. 37 



Thirdly, the locality : Kom Ombo (or Kom Ombos) is north of Assuan, and 

 the specimen is, as Nicoll quite correctly states, somewhat ochreous, but un- 

 doubtedly the same form as the Assuan ones, from where the type of maculata 

 came. On the other hand, the Akasheh birds are not like the Assuan ones, but 

 paler, the middle rectrices more isabelline, the lateral ones rufous isabelline with 

 a black wedge on the inner web only, while in all the maculata which I have seen 

 there is much more dark colour on the middle tail-feathers, and the outer ones 

 are blackish, with, generally, only the outer web isabelline, and that often not 

 entirely. 



Nicoll is in error about the situation of Akasheh ; here again I may have 

 misled him. I said near Ambiikol, because A. E. Brehm, in Reiseskizzen, iii. p. 304, 

 mentions an Ambukol near Akasheh, but that is not the town of Ambukol south 

 of Dongola, for Akasheh is only 112km. south of Wadi Haifa, and the " Ambukol " 

 mentioned by A. E. Brehm is what maps now spell "Ambigol." Akasheh is 

 shown on all better maps, and Nicoll might have known it. This, however, 

 seems to make no difference, for Nicoll agrees with me that the bird from south 

 of Dongola is different from the one from Assuan, and I consider that the Akasheh 

 and Dongola and the Dongola-bend birds are the same. These birds, as I have 

 pointed out, must be called altirostris, and it was my mistake that I formerly 

 placed maculata as a synonym of the latter. 



NicoU wishes to stick to the original locality given by Brehm, in 1855, as 

 " Oberagypten, selten nordlich." This statement is not confirmed by the collec- 

 tion, and, keeping to Brehm's expression, " Oberagypten, selten nordhch " is 

 actually all Nicoll has to stand on, because the description of 1858 does not agree 

 •mth the birds north of Assuan. As I have said, Brehm's names of localities in 

 Africa were sometimes vague, moreover the boundary of Egypt, as fixed by the 

 Firman of February 13th, 1841, just passed through Akasheh, so that the latter 

 might as well be called Upper Egypt as Nubia. No importance can be attached 

 to the words "selten nordlich," which may mean anything, either Northern 

 Egypt or even Europe. It is true that I omitted to quote them — miserable sinner 

 that I am. 



Nicoll wants to use Bianchi's name nubica for this form, but that name has 

 no standing. Bianchi, in Bull. Acad, de St. Petersbourg, xxv. p. 69, 1906, says : 



" 1 17. G. cristata nubica Bianchi, ex Hartert, 1904, I.e. p. 234. Galerida 

 cristata, subsp. ?, Hartert, 1904, Vog. paladrkt. Fawn. i. p. 234 (Abyssinische 

 Kiistenlander). 



Icones. 



Nidif. 



Nubia from Dongola to the Abyssinian coast." 



Thus Bianchi merely gave a name to the birds which I mentioned under 

 No. 376, pp. 234, 235. It is a very bad practice to give a new name to a form 

 which, out of great carefulness, because he had not seen enough, or was otherwise 

 uncertain, an author left unnamed, considering that the question was not settled ; 

 if it ia done, however, such name is technically valid, but in this case Bianchi's 

 name is practically a nomen nudum, as I had not given a diagnosis or differ- 

 entiating description. I said that the Abyssinian coast-countries, perhaps even 

 both sides of the Red Sea, were inhabited by a pale middle-sized Crested Lark, 

 which did not seem to differ from brachyura, further that the birds from the 



