266 BULLETIN 1S6, "UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Mirafra microptera, Gyldenstolpe, Journ. Nat. Hist. Soc. Siam, 1915, p. 171 

 (listed) ; Kungl. Svenska Vet.-Akad. Handl., 1916, p. 30 (Khun Tan, Sop 

 Tui) ; Ibis, 1920, p. 459 ("Throughout northern Siam"). 



Mirafra assamica, Deignan, Journ. Siam Soc. Nat. Hist. Suppl., 1931, p. 154 

 (Chiang Mai). 



Mirafra assamica marionae [partim], de Schauensee, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. 

 Philadelphia, 1934, p. 239 (Chiang Mai).— Riley, U. S. Nat. Mus. Bull. 172, 

 1938, p. 262 (Chiang Mai). 



Mirafra assamica marionae, Deignan, Journ. Siam Soc. Nat. Hist. Suppl., 1936, 

 p. 98 (Chiang Mai). 



Despite Gyldenstolpe's assertion (1920) that this lark is "very 

 common . . . throughout northern Siam," it is, in fact, definitely 

 known only from the basins of the Mae Ping and the Mae Wang 

 (if, indeed, the birds of Lampang Province are of the same race 

 as those of Chiang Mai) . 



On the Chiang Mai plain it is a common inhabitant of dry places 

 with short grass and light bush-cover, such as may be found along 

 roadsides and about ruined phrachedi; after the harvest it occurs also 

 among the rice stubbles, often in small flocks or family parties. When 

 surprised, even in so exposed a situation as the middle of a highway, 

 it has a characteristic habit of first running, then squatting and draw- 

 ing in the head; upon one's closer approach it takes off with feeble 

 flight to drop headlong into denser cover in the manner of a hemi- 

 pode. The song, which is pretty but weak, may be given from a fence 

 post or the top of a bush but is frequently delivered in the course of 

 a special flight, in which the bird leaves its perch, ascends a little way 

 into the air, and, after suspending itself for a few seconds by flutter- 

 ing, sails to the ground on outspread wings. The stomach of one of 

 my specimens contained grass seeds and ants. 



Examples with the gonads enlarged were taken on May 22 and 31, 

 but a bird in postnatal molt (just out of the nest) was collected as 

 early as May 6. Specimens in postjuvenal molt were shot on July 13 

 and August 13, while adults in postnuptial molt were got between 

 August 15 and November 24. 



Adults had the irides bright, light brown or dark brown ; the maxilla 

 blackish brown or horny brown, with the edges of the commissure 

 pale horny or pale fleshy; the mandible pale fleshy, sometimes with 

 the apical half horny white ; the rictus fleshy pink ; the feet and toes 

 yellowish flesh or fleshy yellow ; the claws fleshy or horny brown. 



The adult has the feathers of the upperparts blackish brown, 

 broadly edged on the crown with sandy buff, on the nape with buffy 

 white (to form a more or less distinct collar), on the mantle with 

 ashy brown; the wings blackish brown, the primaries and outer 

 secondaries broadly margined along both inner and outer web with 

 rufous (conspicuous in flight), the inner secondaries and the coverts 

 broadly edged with rufous-buff or sandy buff; the abbreviated tail 



