Mr. R. B. Sharpe's Catalogue 0/ Accipitres, 101 



are so intermediate that I am at a loss where to draw the Hue 

 of demarcation between them. 



Contrary to the opinion which I entertained some years 

 since, I am now fully convinced that S. elgini of the Anda- 

 mans is a very good and distinct species. Mr, Sharpe de- 

 scribes it as differing ''in no respect'^ from the Spilornis of 

 Java, " excepting that it is very much blacker .^^ But this is 

 not quite accurate ; for although the average of specimens of 

 S. elgini are somewhat darker than the average of those of 

 S. bido, I have seen several adult specimens of the latter as 

 dark as, or even darker than, some of S. elgini. A much more 

 definite distinction is the comparative narrowness of the trans- 

 verse pale bars on the primaries and of the lower transverse 

 pale bar on the tail, as pointed out by Lord Tweeddale in 

 ' The Ibis ' for 1873, pp. 299, 300 ; another difference is, that 

 in the adults of S. elgini the white spots almost invariably 

 extend about two inches higher up on the throat than in those 

 of S. bido. 



I have had the opportunity of seeing eight Bornean speci- 

 mens of S. pallidus in the British and Norwich Museums, and 

 in the collection of the Marquis of Tweeddale, and I feel no 

 doubt that this also is a good and distinct species ; but I do 

 not think the colouring of the adult in the figure given in 

 Mr. Sharpe's volume is entirely satisfactory. It seems to me 

 that in this figure the pale bluish grey of the chin, upper 

 throat, and ear-coverts is not sufficiently conspicuous, that 

 the scapulars are somewhat too dark, and that the abdominal 

 and tibial ocellations are represented as smaller than they 

 ought to be, and the latter not sufficiently as grouping them- 

 selves in the form of bars. 



Mr. Sharpe gives the measurement of the wing in the adult 

 male of this species as 14 inches ; but in one such specimen, 

 preserved in the British Museum, the wing only measures 13' 1 . 



Another still more distinct species is S. minimus, from the 

 Nicobar Islands, inserted in the Addenda at p. 459 of Mr. 

 Sharpe's volume, from ' Stray Feathers ' for 1873, p. 464. To 

 the full description there given by Mr. Hume of this inter- 

 esting little Spilornis I have nothing to add, except that, 



