362 Lieut. H. R. Kelham on 



nally, tliough certainly closely allied, the latter species is 

 distinguishable by its generally browner colouring, by the 

 darker crown, which is nearly black, and by its longer bill. 



XXVIII. — Ornithological Notes made in the Straits Settle- 

 ments and in the Western States of the Malay Peninsula. 

 By Lieut. H. R. Kelham, 74th Highlanders. (Part I.) 



Comparatively little having been written concerning the 

 ornithology of the Malay peninsula, the following notes may 

 prove of some interest, more especially to those ornitholo- 

 gists fated to pass most of their life in the far East. That 

 something about Malay birds, however meagre it may be, is 

 much wanted, I well know from personal experience, having 

 still fresh in my memory the up-hill work of my first few 

 months in the country. These I spent among the jungles of 

 the peninsula, daily shooting heaps of specimens, yet without 

 the means of satisfactorily determining their identity or 

 finding out any thing about them beyond what I myself 

 observed, only knowing this bird to be a Pitta, that to 

 belong to the Picidse or Cuculidse, but in most cases being 

 quite in the dark as to their particular species, though after- 

 wards Jerdon^s ' Birds of India,^ a few volumes of ' Stray 

 Feathers,^ and some of the monographs, notably Mr. Sharpens 

 beautiful work on the Kingfishers, gave me much assistance. 

 So, with the view of helping any one, very likely without a 

 library close at hand, about to take up the study of Malay 

 birds, I have put down my experiences, however slight, 

 about each species I met with, at the same time adding de- 

 tails which, with very few exceptions, have been taken from 

 my own specimens before they Avere skinned. 



Regarding the Malay peninsula in an ornithological point of 

 view, the range of mountains running down the middle of 

 the country may be said to divide it into two divisions — the 

 Western or Indo-Malayan, where the avifauna has much in 

 common with that of India and Ceylon, and, on the other 

 hand, the Eastern, of which the ornithology shows a strong 



