48 



median coverts with white spots, smaller coverts unspotted ; all tail- 

 feathers with spots on both webs white above, fulvous below ; malar 

 region and chin grey, the feathers tipped white but the ashy bases 

 showing ; remainder of lower parts brownish white with brown 

 longitudinal streaks. 



The female wants the occipital scarlet streaks. 



Bill and legs plumbeous ; orbital skin lake ; irides pale yellow 

 (Jerdon). 



Length 5 ; tail 1-7 ; wing 3 ; tarsus -55 ; bill from gape -65. 



Distribution. The greater part of the Indian Peninsula, from 

 the base of the N.W. Himalayas to Mysore, and from Mount Abu 

 to Chutia Nagpur, wanting in the open plains of Rajputaua, the 

 Deccan, &c. The Southern forms from the Western Ghats near 

 Belgaum and from Mysore have darker heads, and thus show a 

 passage towards /. gymnophthalmus. 



Habits, $c. This Wojdpecker is found chiefly in forest, but also 

 in groves and gardens in well- wooded districts, and is frequently 

 seen in parties of three or four, on the stems and branches of trees, 

 generally climbing, but sometimes, as Jerdon observes, perching, 

 and hopping from bough to bough. It breeds in the N."W. Pro- 

 vinces in March ; its nest-hole has been several times recorded in a 

 dead branch of a mango-tree, also in siris (Acacia catechu), and 

 the eggs, usually 3 or 4 in number, are white and somewhat 

 spherical, and measure about '7 by '52. 



977. lyngipicus gymnophthalmus. The Ceylon Pigmy 

 Woodpecker. 



Picus gymnophthalmos, Blyth, J. A. S. B. xviii, p. 804 (1849) ; id. 



Cat. p. 64 ; Layard, A. M. N. H. (2) xiii, p. 448 (1854). 

 Yungipicus gymnophthalmus, Jerdon, Ibis, 1872, p. 8; Holdsworth, 



P. Z. S. 1872, p. 427 ; Legge, S. F. i, p. 433 ; id. Birds Ceijl. 



p. 186 ; Hume, S. F. iii, p. 60 ; id. Cat. DO. 164 bis ; Hume $ 



Bourdillon, S. F. iv, p. 389 ; Fairbank, S. F. v, p. 396 : Davison, 



S. F. x, p. 354 ; Parker, Ibis, 1886, p. 183. 

 lyngipicus gymnophthalmus, Harqitt, Ibis, 1882, p. 47 ; id. Cat. B. 



M. xviii, p. 330 ; Gates in Hume's N. 8f E. ii, p. 308. 

 lyngipicus peninsularis, Hargitt, Ibis, 1882, p. 48 ; id. Cat. B. M. 



xviii, p. 331. 



Coloration. Very similar to that of /. TiardiuicJcii, but much 

 darker above and almost or quite streakless beneath in adults. 

 Head above and stripe behind eye blackish sepia-brown. Upper 

 parts dark brown with white cross-bars. Long supercilium ex- 

 tending to neck, cheeks below eye-stripe, chin, and throat white ; 

 no malar stripe ; lower parts unstriped, sullied white in adults, 

 and faintly streaked in the young ; flanks generally streaked in 

 all, and lower tail-coverts with dark shaft-stripes. There are 

 the usual scarlet occipital stripes in males ; the white spots are 

 often small and sometimes wanting on the outer webs of the 

 primaries. 



