FRINGILLIN. 273 
- Sus-ramity, Fringilline. 
-* Bill varied in size and form, more or less conical and thick, 
short and bulged in some, slender and more elongate in others ; 
wing moderate or long ; first primary wauting. 
Genus, Carpodacus, Kaup. 
Bill distinctly turned and compressed at the tip ; commissure 
sinuated, or with a notch near its base ; wings, with the first 
three primaries, sub-equal and longest ; tail distinctly furcate ; 
feet robust ; claws well curved. 
Bucanetes githagineus, Licht. 
732bis.—Murray’s Vertebrate Zoology of Sind, p. 190. 
THE DESERT BULLFINCH. 
Length, 5°7 to 6; expanse, 10 to 11; wings, 32 to3 6; tail, 
2 to 3; tarsus, 0°67 to 0°77 ; bill at front, 0°35 to O41. 
Bill orange-yellow, pale-yellow in some, brownish on culmen ; 
irides brown ; legs fleshy-brown. 
In the male the head is pale bluish-grey, the feathers tipped 
brown ; the chin, throat, breast, cheeks, and ear-coverts a sort of 
blue-grey, the feathers faintly tinged, most conspicuously so round 
the base of the lower mandible, with pale rosy ; the abdomen, 
vent, and lower tail-coverts, very pale rosy-white, the longest of 
the latter with dark shafts; the back and scapulars dull earthy- 
brown, with, when fresh, a faint rosy tinge, which disappears in 
the dried skin, and somewhat greyer towards the nape ; rump 
pale-brown, more decidedly tinged with rosy ; the visible portion 
of the upper tail-coverts rosy-white, more strongly tinged with 
rosy at the margins, the centres and bases of the longest being 
pale-brown ; these, however, are not seen till the feathers are lifted ; 
tail-feathers dark-brown, conspicuously, though narrowly, margined 
with rosy-white, most rosy towards the bases of the lateral 
feathers ; the wings hair-brown, conspicuously margined and 
tipped with pale rose-color, or rosy-white ; the coverts, second- 
aries, and tertiaries most broadly so. There is a very narrow, 
inconspicuous, pale rosy frontal band. The wing-lining and 
axillaries are pure white; the winglet alone is dark-brown, 
unmargined with rosy. 
The female has the whole upper surface and the sides of the head 
and body a dull pale earthy-brown, with only a faint rosy tinge upon 
the rump and upper tail-coverts ; the lower parts a still paler 
earthy-brown with the faintest possible roseate tinge on the breast, 
and becoming albescent on the vent, lower tail-coverts and _ tibial 
plumes ; the wings and tail are as in the male ; but the margins 
are narrower and less conspicuous, and are pale brownish instead 
of rosy-white. 
The Desert Bullfinch is a winter visitant to Kutch and Sind ; 
it does not occur elsewhere within our limits. 
18 
