238 Mr. R. Swiiihoe on the Ornithology of Hainan. 



Length about 4; wing 2; tail 1-417; bill -025, bending 

 downwards from its middle. 



Female. — Wanting the dark markings of the male. Fore- 

 head the same colour as the back ; throat and breast ochreous- 

 yellow, blending with the sulphur of the belly ; vent and sides 

 dingy yellowish ; carpal joint of a more decided primrose- 

 yellow. The wing is of the same length, but the tail slightly 

 shorter, 



A young male is similar to the female, but has a streak of 

 metallic-tinted black down the middle of the throat. 



About the capital city in the north-west I did not meet 

 this lively little bird ; nor in my journey into the interior did I 

 see it, until I got to Shuy-wei-sze, where it was quite a com- 

 mon species among the trees round villages. Its call-note 

 somewhat recalled to mind the " toweet^^ of Reguloides superci- 

 liosus, but is louder and sharper. As it hovers and frolics over 

 a bush, it utters a rapid succession of these notes ; but its voice 

 often runs off into quite a cheerful little song. In the midst of its 

 activity, it often stops suddenly and begins to preen itself, twit- 

 tering gaily all the while. On the banks of the Chinlan river 

 (N.E. Hainan), on the 7th of March, we found it in abun- 

 dance among the mangrove-marshes, flitting from bush to bush 

 and alighting on the topmost twigs. One of my comrades shot 

 one with a charge of No. 1 shot. The specimen was little 

 injured, one pellet only having pierced through the neck. It 

 was difficult to decide what shot to use to do the least damage 

 to the plumage. I usually fired with a minimum charge of 

 small shot ; but this would often knock the bird to pieces, and 

 larger shot scattered so much that it resulted in not hitting at 

 all. The edge of the jungle at Lingshuy and Yu-lin-kan (S. 

 Hainan) yielded plenty of these birds, and we found them also 

 plentiful on West Island, picking the insects off the large red 

 flowers of the tall leafless Bombax malabaricum. At Tuntow 

 on the borders of the Kangen and Changhwa districts, 

 at Haosuy, and at Hungpe (all in W. Hainan) we noticed 

 them again in tolerable numbers, and from all the places noted 

 we got specimens. 1 have thus a good series : and not one 

 shows an extension of the frontal metallic black ; and as the last 



