494 LANIID.E. 



Gates, B. B. i, 



Hume, N. $ E. 



p. 179; Ball, S. F. vii, p. 210; Hume,' Cat. no. 268; Davison, 

 8. F. x, p. 365 ; Barnes, Birds Bom. p. 148*. 

 Jungli Kasya, Hind. ; Chinna akurayi, Tel. 



Coloration. Male. The head, neck, upper back, chin, throat, and 

 upper breast black ; lower breast and sides of the body grey ; 

 abdomen, vent, and lower tail-coverts white ; back, scapulars, 

 lesser wing-coverts, rump, and upper tail-coverts grey, the tail- 

 coverts paler margined ; median wing-coverts chiefly 'black, the 

 tips and the terminal halves of the outer webs grey ; greater 

 coverts black narrowly margined with grey ; primary-coverts all 

 black ; quills black, the primaries with a large patch of white on 

 the inner webs and narrowly margined with white on the outer ; 

 the secondaries more broadly margined with white and tipped with 

 the same ; middle tail-feathers grey, the others black broadly 

 tipped with white. 



Female. The upper plumage, including the head, grey, becoming 

 lighter on the rump and upper tail-coverts, which are cross-barred 

 with dusky ; cheeks, sides of neck, and the whole lower plumage 

 whitish, closely and narrowly barred with black, the bars becoming 

 obsolete on the abdomen ; vent and under tail-coverts pure white ; 

 wing-coverts and quills dark brown, each feather margined with 

 greyish white, and the inner web of each with a white patch as in 

 the male ; ear-coverts greyish mottled with brown and the shafts 

 white ; the middle pair of. tail-feathers grey narrowly tipped with 

 white, the others blackish brown broadly tipped with white. 



In the young each feather of the upper plumage is tipped with 

 a white band preceded by a black band, and the lower plumage is 

 more closely barred than in the adult female. The young male 

 changes into adult plumage in the first spring. 



Iris brownish red ; bill black ; legs and feet black with slaty 

 edges to the scales of the tarsi ; claws black (Legye). 



Length about 7*5 ; tail 3-3 ; wing 4 ; tarsus -8 ; bill from gape 

 85. 



Distribution. The greater part of the peninsula of India from 

 the foot of the Himalayas to Cape Comorin. The western limit 

 appears to be a line drawn through Deesa, Abu, and Sambhar. 

 To the east this species has been found as far as the Bhutan Doars 

 and Furreedpore in Eastern Bengal. In the British Museum 

 there is a specimen collected in Assam by McClelland, and Blyth 

 states that this species occurs in Upper Pegu. This statement 

 has received no confirmation by any other collector in Pegu and 

 must be accepted with reservation. This Cuckoo-Shrike occurs in 

 Ceylon. 



* Lalage melaiwthorax, Sharpe (Cat. B. M. iv, p. 91), from Madras, has 

 since been discovered to be an artificially constructed bird (P. Z. S. 1886, 

 p. 354), the head and neck of a Dicrurus ater having been joined to the body 

 of a Campophaga sykesi. 



