Mr. E. Hargitt on the Genus lyngipicus. 43 



Picus auritus, Gray, List Picid. Brit. Mus. p. 41 (1868) ; 

 id. Hand-1. B. ii. p. 183. no. 8575 (1870). 



Picus sondaicus, Wall. MSS. ; Gray, Hand-1. B. ii. p. 184. 

 no. 8589 (1870) ; Wall, in Salvad. Ucc. Born. p. 43, note 

 (1874). 



lyngipicus fusco-albidus , Salvad. Ucc. Born. p. 42 (1874) ; 

 Nicholson, Ibis, 1879, p. 165 ; Sharpe, Ibis, 1879, p. 240. 

 /. similis /. canicapillo, sed paullo minor et supra brunnes- 

 centior j pileo sepiario-brunneo, nucha nigricante. 



Hub. In regione Indo-Malayana, 



The first notice of this little bird appears to have been by 

 Daubenton, who gave a figure of it under the name of the 

 " Petit Pic des Moluques ; " and Buffon subsequently referred 

 to it as '^'Le petit Epeiche brun des Moluques.^^ Daubenton^s 

 plate must have been published first, though the date on the 

 title-page is subsequent to the work of Bufibn, who, how- 

 ever, settles this question by referring, in the latter volume, 

 to Daubenton^s figure. A great deal of controversy has 

 arisen over this figure, which I am pretty sure was taken 

 from a bird of the Javan race. I think it is going a little 

 too far to trust to the measurements of one of these ancient 

 plates in order to fix the dimensions of a species. Yet this 

 is what Mr. Wallace has done, and has proposed to attach 

 the name of /. moluccensis (Gm.), founded on Daubenton^s 

 plate, to the Pygmy Woodpecker inhabiting Lombock and 

 Flores, while he has given a new name to the Javan bird. I 

 cannot follow Mr. Wallace in this matter ; for I have never 

 heard of any collector but himself having visited Lombock 

 and Flores ; and it is most improbable that the ancient writers 

 ever received any birds from these islands. The name of 

 moluccensis, I think, ought to be rejected, as it gives an en- 

 tirely erroneous idea of the habitat of the bird, no species of 

 Woodpecker being found in the Moluccas. The name 

 P. variegatus of Wagler, though it is founded on a Javan 

 specimen, as shown by Drs. Cabanis and Heine, cannot be 

 employed ; for there is already a Picus varigatus of Latham 

 (Ind. Orn. i. p. 233), Avhich is Picus bicolor of Gmelin, and 

 the name is therefore preoccupied. 



