1872.] MR. E. W. H. HOLDSWORTH ON CEYLONESE BIRDS. 459 



flowering shrubs, and, Mr. Legge says, is often to be seen on the 

 tulip-trees in the principal street of the Fort at Colombo. It is 

 common about Kandy and the surrounding district ; but I have never 

 met with it in the north or on the upper hills. Specimens of this 

 Zosterops from the low country in Ceylon vary somewhat in size, but 

 have been identified in England and Calcutta with Z. palpebrosus, 

 and agree with Jerdon's description of that species except in being 

 generally smaller and in the colour of the bill and legs. He says, 

 "Bill blackish, horny at the base beneath; legs reddish horny;" 

 but I find in freshly-killed birds the following colours : — 



Bill dark leaden, paler at the base beneath ; irides light brown ; 

 legs and feet lavender. 



Ceylon, India, Assam, Arracan, Tenasserim. 



181. Zosterops ceylonensis, n. sp. (Plate XX. fig. 2.) 



Upper surface dark olive-green, deeper on the head and paler on 

 the upper tail-coverts ; a circle of small white feathers round the eye ; 

 lores and below the eye dusky, but not very conspicuous ; chin, throat, 

 and centre of breast greenish yellow, shading at the sides of the neck 

 and breast into the colour of the back, and giving the appearance of 

 an incomplete pectoral band ; the rest of the underparts bluish white, 

 darkest on the flanks, and sometimes tinged in the centre with yellow ; 

 under tail-coverts yellow ; quills and tail dusky brown, both margined 

 externally with olive-green, and the latter faintly marked with trans- 

 verse striae. Sexes alike. 



Length 4*75 inches, wing 2'4, tail 1*8, bill at front *5, tarsus *7. 



Bill dark leaden above, paler below ; irides light brown ; feet 

 lavender. 



This is at all seasons one of the commonest birds at Nuwara Eliya 

 and on the upper hills. It is, I have no doubt, the one recorded by 

 Kelaart as Z. atinulosus, Swainson, an African species. Lavard, in 

 speaking of this bird in his ' Notes on the Ornithology of Ceylon,' 

 says : "Dr. Kelaart writes, 'we fear that the Nuwara Eliya Zosterops 

 is wrongly identified ; it is of a darker greeu than the common 

 Z. palpebrosus.'" He then adds, "I, however, much doubt the di- 

 stinctness of this and the preceding species." A comparison of the 

 two birds, however, leaves no doubt that there is a marked difference 

 between them, both in colour and in the form of the bill. The 

 bird from the Ceylon hills cannot be identified with any recog- 

 nized species ; and Mr. A. O. Hume, to whom I showed specimens of 

 it when I was at Calcutta, told me he had never seen it in any of his 

 many collections from the Neilgherries, a district (as I have before 

 mentioned) agreeing closely in character and productions with the 

 Ceylon hills. Mr. "VV. T. Blanford, in a paper on the Birds of 

 Western India (J. A. S. B. 1869, vol. xxxviii. p. 170), says, in speak- 

 ing of Z. palpebrosus, " the Nilgiri race is a little larger and appears to 

 be a little darker in colour." He gives as the measurements of a speci- 

 men, "beak - 4, wing 2*2, tail 1*75, tarsus "7," and says "the black 

 lores appear more developed in the Nilgiri bird." These observations 

 evidently refer to Z. palpebrosus ; but it appeared to me desirable to 



