5. niRUNDO. 127 



supreme. A curious fact is that there is never any difBculty in re- 

 cognizing the birds from Japan as unmistakable II. gutturalis with 

 the breast-band completely divided ; and I have never seen an inter- 

 mediate or doubtful specimen from the Japanese islands. A parallel 

 case is known in the Blue E,ock-Thrushes : the most typical 

 specimens of Monticola solitaria occur in Japan ; and it is not until 

 China is reached that intermediate forms between it and M. cyanea 

 are met with, the winter specimens from Burmah and the 3Joluccas 

 being so thoroughly intermediate as to be accounted for only by the 

 theory of hybridization of the two forms {cf. Seebohm. Cat. B. v. p. 318). 

 A similar intermingling of the two races of Chimney-Swallow probably 

 takes place likewise in the East ; but I do not suppose that the 

 examples of true H. rustica killed in Europe in the spring of the 

 year, when the breast-band is often mixed with rufous, show a strain 

 of H. cpMuralis, but that the admixture of rufous in the breast-band 

 constitutes a sign of an older bird, at least one of the third year. 

 Some European examples are quite as white on the breast as typical 

 H. gutturalis, but can always be distinguished by the perfect 

 breast-band. 



Speaking of H. rustica var. horreoriim, Mr. Seebohm saj-s that it 

 winters in Burmah, " where it has been re-named //. tytlen." This 

 is not strictly correct, for although specimens from Lake Baikal are 

 identical with the North-American bird, and undoubted examples 

 are in the British Museum from Burmah, yet they cannot be said to 

 be identical with H. tt/fleri, which is a distinct race, leading on to 

 H. saviynii of Egypt, which it resembles in its deep chestnut under 

 surface, whUe it retains the broken breast-band of the H.-gutturalis 

 and H.-horreorum type. This dark form, H. tytleri, is represented by 

 fuU-plumaged males from Irkutsk in the British Museum, as well as 

 from Kamtschatka, while in Ihe Salvin-and-Godman collection are 

 unmistakable examples from Guatemala and Peru. Thus the range 

 of II. tytlen is extended far to the north and west of its originally 

 recorded habitat. 



Mr. Seebohm next alludes to the Egj'ptian Swallow as H. rustica, 

 var. cahirica, of which he gives the habitat as Egypt and Palestine, 

 and says that it is " probably only subspecificaUy distinct, as inter- 

 mediate forms frequently occur in Europe." I myself have never 

 recognized them, although I have examined not only the large series in 

 the British Museum, but those in the collections of Mr. Seebohm 

 himself, Canon Tristram, Mr. Dresser, Capt. Wardlaw Ramsay, and 

 Capt. Shelley. H. savitjnii, as it should be called, is a permanently 

 chestnut-breasted form with a complete breast-band, and is, in my 

 opinion, confined strictly to Egypt and Nubia. AJl the supposed 

 examples of this species collected by Canon Tristram in Palestine 

 are adult H. rustica, and I have examined many of them. They 

 can be matched by birds killed in England. 



When Mr. Seebohm speaks of H. rustica, var. frontalis, he means 

 H. neoxena of Gould, the true H. frontalis of Quoy and Gaimard 

 being from New Guinea and the same as H. javanica of Sparrman. as 

 has been pointed out by Count Salvadori (Orn. Papuasia, etc. ii. p. 4). 



