Mr. E. L. Layard on the Ornithology of Ceylon. 123 



are everywhere continuous with the plates of the perisoma, and 

 either irregular and without suckers as in the SpatangidcB and 

 Echinoneus, or partially ambulacral as in Echinus (the ten 

 suckers round the niouth)^ or divided like the corona into inter- 

 ambulacral and ambulacral plates with suckers, as in Cidaris. 

 In the Holothuriada these plates upon the oral disc are absent, 

 and the oral membrane in the Ophiurida also is naked. 



[To be continued.] 



XIII. — Notes on the Ornithology of Ceylon, collected during an 

 eight years' residence in the Island. By Edgar Leopold 

 Layard, F.Z.S., C.M.E.S. 



[Continued from vol. xii. p. 272.] 



113. Oriolus melaxoceph ALUS, Linn. Ka-cooroolla, Cing. ; 

 lit. Yellow Bird. Mam-coel, Mai. ; lit. Mango Coel from its 

 colom-. Mango Bird and Golden Oriole of Europeans. 



The Ceylon race of this common and widely distributed spe- 

 cies differs from the Indian in ha^ing the tertiaries much less 

 tipped with yellow j nor is this an accidental circumstance, but 

 constant in everj'^ one of the many specimens I have examined. 

 It may not be amiss to mention here that many of our island 

 species differ in some degree from then' continental brethren, 

 though perhaps not sufficiently to constitute distinct races. 

 Mr. Bljiih, whose great experience in Indian ornithology enables 

 him, perhaps better than most, to judge of these gradations of 

 colour and size, early noticed the peculiarities of our fauna in 

 oar correspondence, and I cannot do better than give his own 

 words on this subject*. "Others," says he, "are doubtfully 

 distinct, as Megalaima zeylanica from M. caniceps of S. India; 

 Leucocerca compressirostris (J. A. S. B, xviii. 815) from L. albo- 

 frontata ; and we might have here placed Malacocercus sti'iatus as 



to the posterior lip-like edge of the excavation. The anterior lip is not 

 formed by the opposite edge of the shell, but by the plated buccal mem- 

 brane. 



* The late lamented Mr. Strickland was so much struck with these dif- 

 ferences, that at his request the publication of these " Notes " was sus- 

 pended until we might together go over a series of Ceylon killed specimens 

 and compare them with examples from India and the Indian Archipelago. 

 I am not sorrj- for the delay, since it has enabled me to add several species 

 new to the fauna of Ceylon which have been received from Mr. Thwaites 

 of Peradenia within the last two months ; but I have been deprived of the 

 invaluable notes and remarks promised me, and which would have rendered 

 these memoranda of much use to the naturalist, by the imtimely death of 

 my learned and accomplished friend. 



