386 BULLETIN 186, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



made the following notes on them: "Whole crown (not nape) rufous, 

 but merging on hinder part with olive-brown of back. Throat patch 

 small, not well defined, buffy white; lores buffy gray. All below 

 tawny-buff, more intense on breast. Coronal shafts black, conspicuous 

 only at forehead." These remarks seem to place them with S. r. in- 

 suspecta in the table of characters prepared by me at the original de- 

 scription (pp. 113-114). 



Since the type series of insuspecta came from only two localities so 

 remote from each other as Doi Pha Horn Pok and the Bolovens pla- 

 teau, it was made imperative by the facts of Indo-Chinese zoogeog- 

 raphy that the race be found also at intermediate stations. Its pre- 

 sumable occurrence at Pha Kho (east of the Khun Tan chain) now 

 goes far to rationalize the extensive and anomalous range indicated 

 for the bird by my original material. 



MIXORNIS GULARIS SULPHUREA (Rippon) 



Shan Yellow-breasted Babbler 



Ktachyridopsis sulplwrea Rippon, Bull. Brit. Orn. Club, vol. 11, 1900, p. 11 



("Namehet" [=Nam Chet], Southern Shan States). 

 Mixornis rubricapillus, Gyldenstolpe, Kungl. Svenska Vet-Akad. Handl., 1913, 



p. 21 (Den Chai, Ban Huai Horn) ; Journ. Nat. Hist. Soc. Siam, 1915, p. 165 



(listed). 

 Mixornis gularis minor Gyldenstolpe, Kungl. Svenska Vet.-Akad. Handl., vol. 



56, No. 2, 1916, pp. 60-61 (Pha Kho, North Thailand, Khun Tan, Doi Pha 



Sakaeng). 

 Mixornis gularis minor, Deignan, Journ. Siam Soc. Nat. Hist. Suppl., 1931, p. 137 



(Doi Suthep, Chiang Mai) ; 1936, p. 106 (Doi Suthep, Chiang Mai). 

 Miaornis sumatrana minor, Gyldenstolpe, Ibis, 1920, p. 484 ("Throughout 



northern Siam"). 

 Mixornis gularis sulphurea, de Schatjensee, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Philadelphia, 



1928, p. 566 (Chiang Mai) ; 1934, p. 192 (Chiang Mai).— Riley, U. S. Nat. 



Mus. Bull. 172, 1938, p. 350 (Doi Ang Ka, Khun Tan, Ban Nam Khian).— 



Geeenway, Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., 1940, p. 171 (Doi Nang Kaeo). 

 Mixornis rubricapilla minor [partim], de Schauensee, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. 



Philadelphia, 1929, p. 533 (Chiang Mai). 



This race of the yellow-breasted babbler is very common throughout 

 all the northern provinces except Chiang Rai in lowland areas over- 

 grown with bushy scrub, coarse grass, and especially bamboo; it is 

 somewhat less common at similar territory in the hills, reaching 3,500 

 feet on Doi Suthep, 4,000 feet on Doi Ang Ka, 4,500 feet on Phu Kha, 

 and 5,000 feet on Doi Chiang Dao. 



This species is by far the most numerous of its family in submontane 

 districts and can almost always be found in the great clumps of 

 bamboo that line stream courses and irrigation canals and in the 

 tangled brush that follows the abandonment of cultivation. It occurs 

 in flocks of a dozen or more individuals and is rather parine in ac- 

 tions, as it flits rapidly from twig to twig (usually not far above the 



