234 Ml'. R. Swinhoe on the Oimithohgy of Hainan. 



or "wicked mother-in-law." ''Big as a Magpie/' it says; 

 "colour pure black, eye crimson as blood. It is named after 

 the sound of its voice, which is extremely mournful. Loo-hwang 

 has the following couplet : — 



'' ' The sage that hears the Koo-go's voice, 

 Must expect his wife's spirits to fail.' 



" Imitate its notes, and it will sing with inci'eased energy. 

 It lays in the Magpie's nest, and leaves the Magpie to hatch 

 and rear the young." 



35. Zanclostomus tristis (Lesson). 



On the afternoon of the 18th of February, at Shuy-wei-sze 

 (Central Hainan), while walking up a lane to a village, I noticed 

 some Magpies teasing a long-tailed bird in an overhanging 

 banyan-tree. It uttered no cry, but flew quietly to a hedge, 

 where I shot it. It was a female of this species, with dark eyes 

 and pink-red skin round them. It agrees with a fine male 

 skin I have from India, but is smaller in size, as one might 

 expect in a female, and has a somewhat smaller bill. 



Hainan $ . Wing 5-875 ; tail 12-76. 

 India S- „ G-4; „ 16-75. 



On the jungly hills of Lingshuy (S.E. Hainan) and Nychow 

 (S. Hainan), I saw them on several occasions skipping up from 

 the tangled brush on to the more open branches of the higher 

 trees, and whisking about their long tails like the Urocissa. I 

 shot one or two ; but it was mere waste of life, as I did not 

 succeed in recovering the birds. In the more open country 

 near Nychow city, while riding with the General's Aide-de- 

 camp to visit a hot spring, we put up a beauty, with a tail fully 

 as long as in the Indian male. It flew silently along the hedge, 

 and then, slipping into it, threaded its way to the other side and 

 thence escaped. 



36. Centropus rufipennis (Illiger). 



Called in Hainan the Ho-kee or " Fire-fowl," a name usually 

 applied in China to the domestic Turkey. Among the bamboo- 

 copses and gardens around Kiungchow-foo, and all other towns 

 in Hainan, the Crow-Pheasant was abundant, and one could 



