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BOTAURUS STELLAllIS. 



Botaui'us stellaris (Linn.) ; Sharpe, op. cit., p. 253. 



A specimen of the Common Bittern obtained near Malacca on 

 the 3rd Mai-ch, 1909, bj Mr. F. Day and presented to the Selangor 

 State Museum, by the Raffles Museum, Singapore, is the second 

 on record for the Malay Peninsula, the first having been shot on 

 Perseverance Estate, Singapore, in the autumn of 1908. 



ASARCORNIS LEUCOPTERA. 



Sai'cidiornis leucopterus, Blyth, Journ. Asiat. Soe. Bengal, xviii., 

 p. 820(1849). 



Asarcornis scvitulata, Salvad. {nee Midi.), Gat. Birds Brit. Mm., 

 xxvii., p. 60 (1895) ; Bonhote, P. Z. 8., 1901 (i), p. 80 (Paiehmg). 



This fine duck, one of the rarest of the Anatidse, has hitherto been 

 known from very few specimens, including two only from the Malay 

 Peninsula, an old and deteriorated mounted specimen from the 

 vicinity of Ipoh in the Kinta District of Perak, in the Selangor Museum, 

 and the second, recorded above, obtained by the " Skeat Expedition " 

 in Patelung and now in the Cambridge University Museum. 



Annandale, who passed through Trang in May, 1902, records it as 

 common in that State, thovigh he did not obtain specimens. 



In December, 1909, Mr. Kloss and myself obtained two specimens, 

 male and female, at Chong, in Trang, at the foot of the dividing range. 

 They came to feed in the rice fields at dusk and roosted in patclies 

 of jungle at the edge of the cultivated land. When disturbed, their 

 flight was sustained and powerful, though not particularly rapid. 

 They fed on large fresh water snails of the genus Aiiipullaiia, and 

 their crops and gullets were crammed witli these and with one or 

 two fresh water jniissels. 



Davison is recorded by Hume [Stray Feathers, viii., p. 158 (1879) ] 

 as having met the species in the forests of Kussoom aliout a 150 

 miles north of Trang. but failed to secure specimens. 



CIRlM S MELANOLEUOrs. 



Circus melanoleucus. Blyth ; Sharpe. Cot. Birds Brit. Mas., i., p. 61 



(1874). 



Until recently this handsome species was represented in the 

 Museums of the Federated Malay States by a single shabby mounted 

 specimen without particulars, Mr. Seimund, however, obtained a 

 very perfect adult male in open country near Kuala Lumpur on the 

 27th March, 1909, and states that the bird is not uncommon during 

 the winter months, but is exceedingly wild and hard to approach. Two 

 other species of Harrier, C. a^ruginosus and C. spilonotus, occur with it, 

 the former being by far the most abundant of the three. 



An adult female was obtained also near Kuala Lumpvu- on the 13th 

 Janunrv, 1910. 



