222 



purplish tinge throughout, and hardly any pink is visible. A slight 

 abrasion of the feathers soon causes a change, and as early as 

 December the feathers round the bill, the cheeks, the whole lower 

 plumage, the rump, and the margins of the quills and coverts 

 become a beautiful rose-pink, becoming still brighter as the 

 plumage gets more worn away. 



Female. Besembles the male, but never becomes so rosy in tint 

 at any time of the year. 



Iris brown ; legs and feet fleshy brown ; claws dusky ; soles 

 whitish ; bill orange-yellow, sometimes pale yellow, brownish on 

 upper mandible (Hume). 



Length nearly 6 ; tail 2*2 ; wing 3*5 ; tarsus ? ; bill from, 

 gape '5. 



Young birds appear to be characterized by the presence of some 

 dark streaks on the breast and abdomen. 



Distribution. The whole of Sind and a considerable portion of 

 Kajputana, extending east as far as the Gurgaon district in the 

 Punjab. This Finch is probably a resident, and it is found west- 

 wards throughout Afghanistan and Baluchistan to Europe. 



Habits, fye. Hume observed this species in Sind, feeding in desert 

 places in patches of mustard and other cultivation, and running 

 about a good deal on the ground like Sparrows. 



764. Erythrospiza mongolica. The Mongolian Desert-Finch. 



Carpodacus mongolicus, Swinh. P. Z. S. 1870, p. 447, 1871, p. 387 j 



Scully, S. F. iv, p. 169 ; id. Ibis, 1881, p. 577. 

 Erythrospiza incarnata, Severtz. Turkest. Jevotn. pp. 64. 117 (1873) ; 



Biddulph, Ibis, 1881, p. 82. 

 Erythrospiza mongolica (Swinh.), Hume, S. F. ix, p. 347 note ; Bid- 



dulph, Ibis, 1882, p. 282 ; Sharpe, Cat. B. M. xii, p. 287. 



Coloration. Male. After the autumn moult the whole upper 

 plumage and lesser wing-coverts sandy brown, the centres of the 

 feathers almost everywhere darker brown, the lower rump suffused 

 with rosy ; tail brown, broadly edged with pale buff : median wing- 

 coverts brown, edged with rosy buff ; greater coverts brown, sub- 

 terminally darker and broadly edged with rosy red ; winglet very 

 dark brown, edged with buff ; primary-coverts paler brown, edged 

 with buff: quills brown, the outer webs whity brown, and most 

 of them suffused with rosy red on the greater part of the web ; 

 tertiaries pale buff, with the middle portion brown ; ear-coverts 

 and sides of neck brown ; lores, round the eye, the cheeks, and the 

 whole lower plumage, except the abdomen and under tail-coverts, 

 pale rosy pink ; the two latter parts pale isabelline. 



In the spring and autumn the rosy tinge on the plumage every- 

 where is much brighter owing to the wearing away of the margins 

 of the feathers, and the outer webs of the quills and coverts become 

 crimson in many birds. 



