62 TUEDID^E. 



replaced by brown and the upper tail-coverts are uniform pale 

 rufous ; the lores, ear-coverts, and round the eye are dusky ; 

 supercilium, chin, and throat pale fulvous ; remainder of lower 

 plumage pale orange-rufous ; no white on the side of the neck ; 

 under wing-coverts and axillaries fulvous. In summer the edges 

 of the feathers are much worn down, and the plumage is paler. 



The nestling has the upper plumage brown, the head and neck 

 streaked with fulvous, the back broadly edged with fulvous ; lower 

 part of the rump and upper tail-coverts bright ferruginous ; the 

 lower plumage fulvous, with brown mottlings on the breast. After 

 the first autumn moult the young male has the lower plumage very 

 bright chestnut, but resembles the adult in other respects. 



Bill, legs, and feet black ; iris dark brown. 



Length about 5; tail 1-9; wing 2-8; tarsus '8; bill from 

 gape "65. 



This species differs from the European P. rubicola in having the 

 upper tail-coverts streakless, and the under wing-coverts and 

 axillaries very narrowly tipped with white. 



Although I have assigned Pallas's name to the Indian Bush- 

 Chat, I am by no means satisfied that the Siberian and Indian 

 birds are identical, nor is it certain that any of the Bush-Chats 

 which visit the plains of India in the winter cross over to the north 

 of the Himalayas in the summer. The Indian Bush-Chat breeds 

 so abundantly at all moderate levels in the Himalayas that it is 

 not improbable that the Himalayas form the northern limit of its 

 range. Siberian specimens of Bush-Chats are not very numerous, 

 but all I have seen are so intensely black on the head and back, so 

 intensely rufous on the breast, and, moreover, so small, the wing 

 not exceeding 2-6 in length, that I have not been able to match 

 them, with any breeding bird from the Himalayas, except in the 

 case of one bird from the interior of Sikhim. This small dark 

 race occurs also in Turkestan. 



Distribution. A winter visitor to every portion of the Empire 

 except the southern portion of the peninsula of India south of 

 Mysore. The most southern point from which I have seen a spe- 

 cimen of this species is Belgaum ; but Hume says (S.F. x, p. 389) 

 that it is reported common from South-west Mysore. It occurs in 

 the Andamans. 



In the summer this species is found throughout the Himalayas, 

 from Afghanistan to Assam, up to 5000 feet. Should the Indian 

 bird prove identical with the Sibeiian form, its range will extend to 

 Japan and China on the east and to Northern E-ussia on the west. 

 Specimens from. Abyssinia are quite inseparable from Indian 

 birds. 



Habits, 6fc. Breeds in the Himalayas at all heights up to about 

 5000 feet, constructing a nest of grass and rnoss in small shrubs or 

 in holes of walls, and laying four or five eggs, which are pale green 

 marked with brownish red, and measure about '7 by "55. 



