Letters, Announcements, ^c. 215 



Museum^ published in 1881, makes no remarks on that curious 

 bird which was named Merula dactyloptera by Bonaparte. He 

 does not seem even to be aware of Bonaparte^s description, 

 as among the synonyms of Merula merula, p. 236, he quotes 

 Turdus dactylopterus, Bp., fide Gray, Hand-list B. i. p. 255, 

 n. 3714 (1869). In my opinion more completeness and care 

 would be desirable in such a standard work as that mentioned, 

 in which at least all the more important references ought to 

 be included. 



Besides this I wish to point out that in the history of this 

 bird there has crept an important error as regards the locality 

 from which it came. 



The references belonging to the Hook-winged Ouzel, or 

 Blackbird, are the following : — 



Merula daciijloptera, Bp. Compt. Rend. Ac, Sc. Paris, 

 xliii. p. 412 (1856) ; id. Institut, 1856, p. 313 ; Owen, Philos. 

 Trans, vol. 153. p. 39, note (1863) ; Parker, P. Z. S. 1863, 

 p. 515. 



Turdus dactylopterus, Sclat. Ibis, 1881, p. 279 ; Swinh. 

 Ibis, 1864, p. 364 j Sharpe & Dresser, Birds of Eur. pt. x. 

 p. 10 (1872) ; Gigl. Icon. Avif. Ital. sp. 104 (1883). 



Turdus [Merula) dactylopterus, G. R. Gray, Hand-list, i. 

 p. 255, no. 3714 (1869). 



Merula dactylopterus, Gieb. Thes. Orn. ii. p. 578 (1875). 



Sharpe and Dresser have given a woodcut of the wing of 

 M. dactyloptera, type, and they have expressed the opinion 

 that the bird is an individual variation of Turdus merula ; 

 " f or,-*^ they say, " it must be remembered that, although 

 many people have visited Palestine and Syria, no one has ever 

 succeeded in getting a second specimen of the bird, and Bona- 

 parte^s type still remains unique in the Paris Museum.^' 



Prof. Giglioli, who has inspected the type specimen, agrees 

 with Sharpe and Dresser, and I, too, am inclined to be of the 

 same opinion. But I must point out that Sharpe and Dresser^s 

 remark as to the bird never having been found again in Pales- 

 tine and Syria has no value, since I have discovered that it did 

 not come from there, but from the neighbourhood of Smyrna, 

 in Asia Minor. 



