onXlTUnLOGY. 409 



or whatever the species maj- be called, as Lord Walih^n says P. rom strictly applies 

 to the Bengal race. 



P. CAXiCEPs, Blyth. Great XicoLar. Jlontscliall. Koiidul. 



P. scnisTicicrs, Hudg. Aiakan. Touiig-ngoo. 



P. Finschii, Hume. 



The Tounu;-ii^i"J race has of course received a name from Hume, thouf^li neither 

 AValdcn nor lilyth ditl'ereutiate it speciiically. 



P. VIBRISSA, Bodd. a]iud filyth, 

 P. Lathami, Fiusch J (red bill). 

 P. melanorhijnchun, Wagler. ? Arakan. Pegu. Tenasserim. 



Blyth says: "An exceedingly common species in the forests of British Burma, 

 and Mason remarks of it (in particular) that ' immense lloeks of Parrakeets may 

 bo seen simultaneously descending on the rice-fields, where persons have to bo in 

 constant attendance to drive them away during the season of harvest ; ' while of 

 P. torquatus he notices that it is ' often seen in the riee-fields, but in smaller com- 

 panies, which have not the habit of simultaneous descent.' Westward, the present 

 sjiecies is common in the Terai region of the E. Himalaya, bnt its range does not 

 extend further into India, whence its syuonjm oi ponticerianus is a misnomer. Great 

 numbers of the very young are brought eveiy season to Calcutta from Chittagong, 

 and it is remarkable that from the earliest age the males only have the U])[)er 

 maudilile coral-red. In a presumed male' which I possessed in captivity, the upper 

 mandible changed fi'oni black to coral-red when the bird was about eighteen months 

 old ; and I have seen numerous specimens which had been killed when the change 

 was in progress. I have also shot red-billed and black-billed specimens out of the 

 same flock, and therefore cannot admit the P. niijrirontrh, Hodgson, as a distinct 

 species, differing only in the colour of the upper mandible. Moreover, the same 

 sexual diversitj" in the colouring of the bill, whether permanently or otherwise, 

 occurs in several kindred species. Rarely, the lower mandible is also red in Burmese 

 .specimens, almost constantly so in Javanese examples ; but I have been unable to 

 detect the slightest difference of plumage on comparison of skins from Nip;'d, Arakein, 

 and Java." 



Hume asserts on the contrary that the entire bill in the young of both sexes is 

 black, which may probably be accepted as the rule, but not without such exceptions 

 as have warranted Mr. Blyth in a contrary assertion, though Mr. Hume's superior 

 advantages of observation must give his assertion the greater weight. In Stray 

 Feathers, ii. p. 1, Mr. Hume administers an admirable castigation to Dr. Finsch for 

 his flippant and conceited rejection of the testimony of such naturalists as Blyth and 

 Jerdon and others regarding various species of Indian Parrots. On the strength it 

 would seem of a wrongly sexed bird, or perhaps au old female wliich has assumed 

 the colouration of the male, \)t. Finsch proceeds to show how all Indian zoologists 

 who have asserted that the females have black beaks, must be wrong. Mr. Hume 

 is no doubt severe, but no men are convicted of error by a personal appeal to them to 

 only be kind enough to see it themselves. Mr. Hume says {I.e. p. 21), "In the 

 youngest birds that I have seen taken, when just able to fly from the nest-hole, 

 while two birds, one a specimen of Lalhami (which I erroneoudi/ conceived to be the 

 father), with a red copper mandible, and the other a specimen of melaiwrlnjnchus 

 (wliich I erroneoHshj conceived to be the mother), shrieked round us, which two 

 specimens curiously enough on dissection did prove (unless I erroneounh/ conceived 

 the fact) to be respectividy male and female, I say these young birds {hyhrids 

 doubtless!) had both mandibles blackish." 



PsiTTixi's iNcKKTUs, Shaw. Tenasscrim south of Mergui. 



P. Malaccensis, Lath. 



LORIINiE. 

 In the Lories the tongue is furnished with a protrusile tuft of elongated papillae, 

 enabling them to extract the nectar of flowers, which, with soft fruits, constitutes 

 their food. 



' " Fcmalu"' iu text, en'orc Diaboli? 



