70 BUBONIDJi, 



Sco^ys i/iu and its allies, it is difficult to assign specific characters. 

 Nevertheless I shall divide them into subspecies with distinctive 

 titles, as follows ; but the plates will give a still better idea of the 

 birds than any descriptions, 



Subsp. a. Scops magicus. (Plate V.) 



StrLx magica, Mii/l. XutuurJ. Gesch. Land- en Vogelk. p. 110. 



Otus magicus, Schl. Fuuua Jap. Aces, p. 2o. 



Scops magicus, lip. Cunsp. i. p. 40 ; Stricld. Orn. Sijn. p. 203 ; Scltl. 



Mm. P.-B. Oli, p. 22 ; Gray, Hand-l. B. i. p. 4U ; 8chl. Itcvuc 



Accipitr. p. 11. 

 Lempijius magicus, Bp. Rev. et Mag. de Zool. 1854, p. 543. 

 Ephialtes magicus, Wall. Ibis, 18U8, p. 24 ; Wald. Tr. Z. S. viii. 



p. 39. 



Adult female. General colour above dark sandy buff, evciywherc 

 on the upper siu'face barred with blackish, these dark cross markings 

 being little, if any, narrower than the intervening light spaces ; so 

 that this species has a very strongly barred appearance, all the 

 feathers being at the same time broadly streaked with black down 

 the centre ; hind neck rather lighter than the back, the interspaces 

 rather paler and broader ; scapulars externally yellowish buft", 

 marked with blackish only towards or at the tip ; wing-coverts 

 decidedly darker than the back, the least ones spotted with sandy 

 buff, the median and greater series barred with this colour, many 

 of the cross bars paler and inclining to ycUo^\ish externally, some 

 of the inner greater coverts also barred with yellowish near the tips 

 of the feathers ; primary coverts sandy buff, -n'ith dark brown bases, 

 all of them also mottled with dark brown vermiculatious in the form 

 of irregular bars ; quills duU brown on the inner webs, which, how- 

 ever, are indistinctly crossed with paler bands of sandy buff, espe- 

 cially near the tips, the light bands represented on the outer webs 

 by sandy buff bars more or less inclining to white externally, and 

 producing a distinctly chequered appearance, the brown interspaces 

 very indistinct, and broken up by reason of extensive vermiculations 

 of sandy buff; the secondaries very distinctly barred across with dark 

 brown and sandy buff, exactly in the same manner as the primaries, 

 but without the Avhitish spots ou the outer web ; tail-feathers very 

 distinctly barred for their whole extent, the bars strongly charac- 

 terized on the outer feathers, the dark brown and sandy buff cross 

 markings being almost equal in width, the brown bars all more 

 or less broken up with minxite sandy mottliugs, the centre feathers 

 strongly barred with dark brown near the base, the bars somewhat 

 dissolved towards the tips of the feathers ; loral plumes whitish at 

 base, dark brown at tip, the shafts blackish and elongated into hair- 

 like bristles ; feathers over the fore part of the eye whitish, nar- 

 rowly tipped with dark brown ; ear-coverts sandy biiff, faintly 

 barred with brown, the shafts distinctly whitish, and giving a nar- 

 rowly streaked appearance ; cheeks sandy buff, the feathers tipped 

 broadly with black, and very stiff in character, extending backwards 

 behind the ear-coverts and forming an indistinct ruff'; chin huffy 



