296 ASIONID^E. 



1176. Scops balli. The Andaman Scops Owl. 



Ephialtes spilocephalus, apud Ball, J. A. S. B. xli, pt. 2, p. 276 ; 



id. S. F. i, p. 53 ; nee Blyih. 



Ephialtes balli, Hume, S. F. i, p. 407 (1873) ; ii, pp. 151, 491. 

 Scops modestus, Walden, A. M. N. H. (4) xiii, p. 123 (1874) ; 



id. Ibis, 1874, p. 129 ; Hume, Cat. no. 74 quint. 

 Scops balli, Sharpe, Cat. B. M. ii, p. 100 ; Hume, Cat. no. 74 oct. ; 



Sharpe, Yark. Miss., Aves, p. 151, pi. xx ; Blanford, Ibis, 1894, 



p. 526. 



Coloration. Face and lores fulvous brown to grey, barred with 

 darker brown, loral plumes tipped black ; forehead and supercilia 

 pale, upper surface rufous brown, paler or darker, finely freckled 

 and mottled with black, and dotted over with subcruciform or 

 polygonal whitish or buff spots nearly surrounded by black ; the 

 larger white spots on the outer scapulars also bordered with 

 black almost throughout, and sometimes crossed by brown or 

 black lines ; quills brown, speckled at the ends and on the 

 outer webs, with conspicuous white spots on the outer webs of the 

 primaries and fulvous notches on the inner webs of all near the 

 base; tail brown with paler cross-bars, sometimes indistinct or 

 broken ; lower parts paler and greyer than the upper, speckled 

 with dark brown or white, and spotted with whitish brown-tipped 

 spots. 



The young (S. modestus} are dull brown, closely but indistinctly 

 barred, especially on the head, neck, and wing-coverts ; the white 

 or buff spots on the upper and lower surface are wanting, and the 

 quills are barred throughout with pale rufous. 



Colours of soft parts not recorded. 



Length about 7'5; tail 3; wing 5'4 ; tarsus 1. Tarsus slender, 

 lower third generally bare ; fifth quill longest. 



Distribution. The Andaman Islands. There can, I think, be no 

 question but that S. modestus is merely the young, its small size 

 (wing 4-75) being simply due to immaturity. As Hume has shown, 

 other young specimens show a passage between 8. modestus and 

 .$. balli. Some of them are more rufous than adults. 



1177. Scops sagittatus. The Large Malay Scops Owl. 



Ephialtes sagittatus. Cass. Proc. Ac. Nat. Sci. Philad. iv, p. 121 



(1850). 

 Scops sagittatus, Sharpe, Cat. B. M. ii, p. 98; Gates, S. F. v, 



p. 247 ; Hume $ Dav. S. F. vi, p. 35; Hume. Cat. no. 74 nov. ; 



Oates, B. B. ii, p. 156. 



Coloration. Feathers around eyes deep ferruginous red ; cheeks and 

 lores whitish, the former faintly barred, the latter with brown ends ; 

 behind the eye pale rufous, succeeded by a broad crescentic band 

 of dark ferruginous brown on each side of the neck ; broad frontal 

 band, extending above the eyes to the aigrettes, white with faint 

 brown bars, sharply divided from the crown, which with the upper 

 parts generally is dull chestnut without distinct speckling, but with 



