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Letters, Announcements, ^c. 287 



collected chiefly in the Etawah and Cawnpore districts of the 

 North-West Provinces. All our birds appear to belong to one 

 and the same species ; no constant difference, however minute, 

 was discoverable : toes and tarsi were more or less elongated and 

 slender, and slight differences were observable in the size and 

 shape of both bills and claws. In colour and in the amount of 

 striation of the upper and spotting of the lower surfaces the 

 most marked differences existed, and there was no single example 

 not connected with others by intermediate forms. There were 

 birds manifestly identical with those described 3iS Pipastes macula- 

 tus (Hodgs.), with those described as P. ogilis (Sykes), and, again, 

 those usually referred to P. arboreus ; but that one and all of 

 these forms were referable to one and the same species appeared 

 to me indisputable. Differences of age, sex, and season will 

 probably be found, when time is made to work out the question, 

 thoroughly to account for the marked individual variations 

 noticeable in this species. 



Further, I took nine specimens of P. nrbureus from England 

 and France, and compared them with our Indian birds. There 

 was no single one of them to which an exact duplicate could not 

 be selected from amongst my Indian series. There were several 

 types of the Indian bird unrepresented amongst the European 

 specimens, but not one of the latter without its Dopj)elganger 

 \\i I may use the term) among the former. 



That all our Indian Pipits of the Pipastes group, known as 

 P. agilis, P. maculatus, and P. arboreus, ought to be united as 

 one species under the latter, or possibly some older, name, I can 

 now scarcely doubt. 



This, however, is not the only difficulty : scarcely any bird can 

 seem more distinct than Anthus rosaceus as we get it in its fine 

 summer plumage in the Himalayahs, with its dark green upper 

 surface, rich vinous-coloured throat and upper breast, and bright 

 primrose-yellow axillaries and wing-lining; but this bird in 

 winter plumage is widely different, and I confess that the idea 

 has continually occurred to me, since I have been examining very 

 large series of specimens, that this bird must interbreed with P. 

 arboreus. As for differences in shape of bill, and length and 

 strength of tarsus, toes, and claws, these are by no means con- 



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