226 Mr. Blyth's Commentary 



to be added from the desert territory of the north-west, as also 

 from the extreme south of the peninsula, where it may be ex- 

 pected that some of those will be found to inhabit which at pre- 

 sent are known only from Ceylon. Indeed the latter are so few 

 in number, and those few congeneric in every instance (or at least 

 approximately so in the only two slightly exceptional cases'^) with 

 birds of continental India, that their exclusion from Dr. Jerdon's 

 work must be regretted. In a note to his Introduction (p. xxxix) 

 he indeed remarks, " I would greatly like to have included all 

 British India, from Assam to Tenasserim and Ceylon, in the 

 scope of the present work ; but I was afraid that this addition 

 would have swelled my work to an unwieldy bulk." To me it 

 appears that the great Indo-Chinese subregion, from the valley 

 of the Brahmaputra southward, might very well be separately 

 treated of; whereas Ceylon is undoubtedly subordinate to the 

 special Indian subregion, notwithstanding that a contrary opinion 

 has been expressed f- Some thirty to forty species of birds only 

 (as specific distinctions are variously admitted, and some of these 

 distinctions are very slight) are known to me at present as being 

 peculiar to the island, several being merely specialized insular 

 representatives of kindred races — or very near congeners — on 

 the mainland, though the limits of this specialization can only 

 be arbitrarily traced ; while others are most strongly characterized 

 species, the recognition of which must be universally accepted. As 

 examples of the former may be mentioned Loriculus coulaci as 

 distinguished from L. vernalis, Pomatorhinus melanurus from 

 P. horsfieldi, Palumbus torringtoni from P. elphinstonii ; and 

 as examples of the latter may be adduced the Jungle-fowl and 

 Spur-fowl of Ceylon {Gallus stanleyi smd Galloperdix zeylanensis), 



* Phcenicojihceus, as distinct from Xanclostointis (v. Melias) and Meropixus, 

 Bonap. (Comptes Rendus, 1854, xxxviii. p. 58), founded upon a species 

 peculiar to Ceylon, but which is barely separable from Ruhigula, nobis. 



t Vide Tennent's ' Ceylon ' (Introduction, p. xxxii, &c.). The prin- 

 cipal argument relates to the Cinghalese Elephant, which was supposed 

 to be identical with that of Simiatra, but not with that of India. I am 

 now completely convinced of the specific identity of all living Asiatic 

 Elephants (as far as hitherto discovered at least, and it is most improbable 

 that another should yet remain to be distinguished) ; and such was the 

 matured opinion of the late Dr. Falconer, unquestionably the highest au- 

 thority for the species of Proboscideans, living or extinct. 



