from Somaliland and Southeim Abyssinia. 653 



With the large amount of additional material now avail- 

 able, we have made a careful re-examination of C. erythro- 

 genys and the allied species and have arrived at the following 

 conclusions : — 



1. C. erythrogenys (Riipp.) is not the female of C. robust a 



(Riipp.), but a perfectly distinct species: so far we 

 agree with Count Salvadori. 



2. C. erythrogenys (Riipp.) is not synonj^mous with C 



murginalis (Heugl). In this we differ from Count 

 Salvadori for the following reasons : — C. marginalis 

 is found near the White Nile, and apparently does 

 not occur in S. Abyssinia, It has the upper tail- 

 coverts uniform buff, with very rarely any trace of 

 dark shaft-spots on (one or two of) the feathers ; 

 while in C. erythrogenys the upper tail-coverts are 

 black, margined all round with rufous huff, which gives 

 them a heavily spotted appearance. 



Dr. Sharpens key to the species of Cisticola {cf. Cat. 

 ]3, Brit. Mus. vii. p. 237) leads one to suppose that 

 C. marginalis comes under the heading " h'. Upper 

 tail-coverts centred ivith Hack" ; but both Heuglin's 

 original description and the plate {cf. Ibis, 1869, 

 p. 94, pi. i. fig. 1) shew that the upper tail-coverts 

 are uniform buff. 



3. C. erythrogenys may always be distinguished from the 



allied C. tinniens from S. Africa by the black stripes 

 on the head commencing at the base of tlie hill, whereas 

 in C. tinniens the forehead is uniform rufous and the 

 black stripes commence just in front of the eye. 



4. Specimens of C. erythrogenys collected by Lord Lovat 



in S. Abyssinia were wrongly referred to C luguhris. 



5. From C. chiniana the present species may be distin- 



guished by its smaller size, by the heavily striped 

 black and rufous-buff plumage of the upper parts, and 

 by the bright cinnamon-buff outer margin to the 

 quills. 

 [We found the Rufous-cheeked Fantail-Warbler common 

 on the rolling grass tablelands. — A. E. P.] 



SER. Vril. VOL. I. 2 X 



