358 Mr. Blyth's Commentary 



shot a Wryneck, in India, in the act of ascending the bole of a 

 tree Woodpecker-fashion. I have tried the same experiment 

 with Barbets, both with a winged old bird and young birds 

 about ready to fly ; and they have just as much notion of climbing 

 as a Sparrow has, neither more nor less. It is true that they 

 breed in the holes of trees, and so also do the Toucans ; and I 

 have seen one fly direct to its nest-hole, as a Titmouse would 

 do, but never clinging to the bark. Of Xanthol(Ema indica, Mr, 

 Layard remarks — " Like the other species, it breeds in holes, 

 and I have seen it in the act of excavating them in decaying 

 portions of living trees" (Ann. Mag. N. H. 1854, xiii. p. 448). 

 Dr. Jerdon remarks — " I never saw any of these Barbets 

 climbing, like a Woodpecker, nor heard them tapping, that I 

 am aware of.^' They are common birds, sometimes not at all 

 shy, and are at any time under the observation of a natu- 

 ralist in India as familiarly as a Chaffinch is here; and had 

 they climbing-propensities, such could not escape the notice of 

 habitual observers ; moreover they feed on fruit and berries, and 

 not upon insects and wood-boring larvae, and have therefore no 

 business to traverse the boles and larger branches of trees like a 

 Woodpecker or Nuthatch. They are anything but "omnivo- 

 rous " as Mr. Gould intimates in his ' Handbook to the Birds of 

 Australia^ (i. p. 2). I have kept them for months in captivity, 

 and have invariably found them to refuse insect-food, although, 

 in a captive state, Mr. Layard found one to exhibit a carnivorous 

 and predatory propensity, which I should say was most unusual; 

 but this again is in accordance with their affinity to the Toucans. 

 A luteino variety of Xantholoima indica (the Bucco luteus of 

 Lesson) is figured by DesMurs (Icon. Orn. pi. 21). I have 

 seen similar luteino varieties (corresponding to albinos) in vari- 

 ous other green birds, as Parrots, Bee-eaters, fruit-eating 

 Pigeons, &c. The yellow cage Canary-bird is a familiar instance 

 of the kind, which has the pink eyes of an ordinary albino. 



192. Megal^ma hodgsoni, Bonap. 



M. lineata, auct., of North-eastern India and the Indo- 

 Chinese countries generally, as far at least as Cambogia, where 

 the species is mistaken by Prof. Schlegel for the Javan M. 



