300 Lord Tweeddale on Birds from 



Bucco australis, Horsf., EalHes, t. c. p. 285^ " Sumatra/^ 

 nee Horsf. 



Sumatran, Bornean^ and N.E. Malaecan examples exhibit 

 no difference. 



53. Arachnothera longirostra. 



Certhia longirostra, Lath. Ind. Orn. i. p. 299, " Bengal ^' 

 (1790). 



Arachnothera affinis, Blyth, J. A. S. B. 1846, p. 43, " East- 

 ern coast. Bay of Bengal, from Arracan to Malacca, Mysore 

 district. 



Arachnothera pusilla, Blyth, Cat. Calc. Mus. App. p. 328. 

 no. 1348 (1849). 



Sumatran examples are identical, both in size and plnmage, 

 with Javan. The only difference I am able to detect between 

 Javan individuals and those from Malabar, Assam, and coun- 

 tries south to Malacca, including British Burma, and also 

 those from Borneo, is one of dimensions, these last being 

 smaller and having shorter and perhaps slenderer bills. But 

 I possess Javan examples, in perfect plumage, as small as 

 any from the other localities named — that is, with a difference 

 of three, and even nearly four, eighths in the length of 

 the wing of the largest and smallest Javan species. These 

 differences in size may be characteristic of sex ; but a fully 

 plumaged Bornean male (Busan), sex ascertained by Mr. 

 Everett, has the short wing of my smallest Javan examples. 

 A Tonghoo male, with bright orange pectoral tufts, has a 

 shorter wing and bill than a Javan male in like breeding- 

 plumage. There is not, therefore, sufficient ground for sepa- 

 rating specifically any one or more races of this spider-hunter ; 

 and if there were, the Javan and Sumatran race would require 

 the new title, and not the race named affinis (subsequently 

 pusilla) by Blyth ; for it supplied Latham with the type of 

 his C, longirostra. 



54. Arachnothera flavigastra. 



Anthreptes flavigaster, Eyton, P. Z. S. 1839, p. 105, "Ma- 

 lacca.'' 



Arachnothera eytonii, Salvador!, t.c. p. 182 (1874). 



