CALLISITTA. 609 



"Length, 140 ; wing, 78.5 ; tail, 53 ; culmen, 12.5 ; tarsus, 15." (Blasius.) 

 Muscicapa tessacourbe Scopoli and M. luzoniensis Gmelin were both 

 based upon Sonnerat's plate. The species was unrecognized until Platen 

 collected a male in Mindanao. Blasius described this specimen under the 

 name Micropus nehrkorni, suggesting the probability that it was the same 

 as Muscicapa luzoniensis. Sonnerat's figure does not look much like a 



Penthornis. 



Family SITTLD^. 



Bill slender and pointed, about as long as head; neither notched nor 

 toothed; culmen but very slightly curved; nostrils oval, nearly hidden 

 by the antrorse frontal plumes; shafts of the latter hair-like and extend- 

 ing beyond the nostrils ; rictal bristles very small ; wing long, pointed and 

 somewhat curved ; first primary equal to about one-third of second ? fourth 

 and fifth nearly equal and longest; second between fifth and sixth in 

 length; tail square, very short, scarcely more than one-half the wing; 

 tarsus distinctly scutellate, equal to culmen from base; three anterior 

 toes with their basal joints united; outer toe much longer than inner toe; 

 hind toe with claw much longer than tarsus and nearly equal to middle 

 toe with claw. 



Genus CALLISITTA Bonaparte, 1850. 



Upper parts of body blue, forehead black; under parts, buff or cin- 

 namon, more or less washed with lilac. 



Species. 



a 1 . Lores entirely black ; mantle uniform blue like the back palawana ( p. 609 ) 



a 2 . Lores not entirely black, the lower part white or buff; mantle somewhat 



ligher than the rest of the back. 

 6 1 . Breast and abdomen lighter, with little or no lilac Avash. 



c 1 . Larger; under parts much darker; breast vinaceous-cinnamon. 



cenochlamys (p. 610) 



c 2 . Smaller; under parts much lighter; breast cream-buff., mesoleuca (p. 610) 

 V. Breast and abdomen darker, and heavily washed with lilac., lilacea (p. 611) 



599. CALLISITTA PALAWANA (Hartert). 

 PALAWAN NUTHATCH. 



Sitta frontalis GADOW, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus. (1883), 8, 358 (part). 

 Dendrophila frontalis WHITEHEAD, Ibis (1893), 53; SHARPE, Hand-List 



(1903), 4, 351 (part). 



tiitta frontalis palawana HARTEBT, Bull. Brit. Orn. Club (1905), 16, 11. 

 Callisitta frontalis MCGREGOR and WORCESTER, Hand-List (190G), 94. 



Balabac (Steere, Everett); Palawan (Steere, Platen, Whitehead, Steere Exp., 

 Bourns & Worcester, Doherty, Celestino, White). 



Adult male. Above french-blue; lores and forehead velvet-black; a 

 black stripe over eye, extending from the black frontal patch to nape; 

 under parts vinaceous-buff, chin and throat considerably paler; abdomen 



