THE BULBULS. 27 



renders it a very desirable bird where it can be viewed at 

 close quarters. I should think, also, that being a hill-bird 

 it would be particularly suitable to any one who would 

 like on retiring to keep Bulbuls in a garden aviary at home. 

 It might be better called the Curled-crested Bulbul, for 

 its cheeks are not nearly so conspicuously white as those 

 of the next Bulbul on my list. 



THE WHITE-EARED BULBUL (Molpastes leucotis), called 

 Bhooroo in Sindh and Kushandra in the Punjab, is figured, 

 as above remarked, on Plate V (Fig. 3), and I need not 

 further describe it, though attention may be drawn to the 

 shortness and bushiness of its crest, and to the rich yellow 

 of the patch under the tail, which is quite of a saffron 

 tint. A bird just like it, but with a much longer and 

 more pointed crest and sulphur yellow under tail-patch, 

 was once got by Mr. Hume at Jalalpoor near Jhelum in 

 the Punjab, and has been described by Mr. Gates as a new 

 species, under the name of Molpastes humii. It would be 

 very interesting to get hold of more specimens of this form, 

 for so far only the one is known, and it may perhaps be 

 only a " sport " or variety, though it would not be any the 

 less interesting on that account. The ordinary White-eared 

 Bulbul has a wide range in the dry north-western and 

 central parts of India, and extends into Persia to the 

 westward. Persian birds are noted to be finer songsters 

 than Indian, and make very nice cage pets. This is, 

 indeed, the nicest cage or aviary bird of all the Bulbuls, 

 being of an unusually tame and friendly disposition even 

 when caught old. It is also unusually intelligent ; I 

 remember a bird which I had only had a day or so escaping 



