42 FIRST LIST OF THE BIRDS OF THE SOUTH KONKAN. 



Light, of course, operates as an auxiliary, and intensifies the 

 action of humidity, or the converse ; and the palest and the 

 darkest forms will be found iu tropical deserts and tropical 

 swamps. 1 do not think that heat has anything directly to 

 say to the matter, but as practically in nature greater inten- 

 sity of light for the year round is accompanied by a higher 

 average temperature, it may often appear to be a factor, and 

 indirectly, in so far as in well-watered regions it increases the 

 humidity of the atmosphere, it no doubt is so. But the primary 

 cause of these variations in tint is, I believe, a difference in 

 the average rainfall and average humidity of the atmosphere. 

 Generally the two go together, but by no means invariably. 

 In Simla the rainfall is over 60 inches, often much more ; but 

 during the major portion of the year the atmosphere is dry to 

 a degree, and the birds are pale. Again, there are many 

 localities in the Terai where the rainfall scarcely exceeds 40, 

 where, owing to perennial swamps, fed by the distant-wooded 

 hills, and the high average temperature, the atmosphere is 

 always more or less laden with moisture, and there the colours 

 of birds are more intense. 



But it is useless to pursue this question further here. Suffice 

 it to say that the Batnagiri Glaticidium is radiatum, only 

 half transformed by increased moisture into malabaricum. — 

 A. 0. H.] 



81.— Ninoxlugubris, Tick. 



Vengorla. 



22nd February 1880, Male. — Length, 11 ; wing, 8| ; tarsus, 

 1£; tail, 5. Cere green; bill dusky with pale tip; feet yellow; 

 irides golden. 



Single specimen obtained in a cocoanut garden. 



I had some difficulty in fixing this bird, aud I may be 

 wrong in calling it lugubris. The tail is pale grey, tipped with 

 dirtv rufescent white — one of the characteristics, according to 

 Mr." Sharpe {vide S. F., IV., 285 ) of lugubris. But the head 

 is not grey but dark brown and concolorous with the back as 

 in scutulata. The axillaries are as in lugubris, barred white and 

 brown. I have no other specimens to compare it with, but it 

 evidently cannot be classified according to the points given by 

 ftlr. Sharpe. 



[This must be accepted as lugubris, but Mr. Vidal's remarks 

 are correct ; the diagnosis given by Mr. Sharpe often fails ; 

 'from many parts of the country forms are sent quite interme- 

 jdiate between lugubris and scutulata, and the more I see of 

 these Ninox, the more I incline to the belief that they will have 

 hereafter to be extensively u lumped." — A. 0. H.] 



