102 NOTES ON GEOCICHLA INNOTATA, BLTTH. 



coloured than those of a good many citrina. Before my friend Mr. 

 Seebohm accepts shades of colouring as of specific value in this 

 group, he should get together a couple of hundred specimens 

 of the two or three supposed species he wishes to contrast. 

 People laugh at the enormous, and, I admit, unwieldly series of 

 every species that I retain ; and I have myself repeatedly 

 thought of weeding out my museum, but it is only by the help 

 of such series that one can confute ornithologists' intent upon 

 making species on slight differences in shade of colour. Here I 

 have before me citrina and innotata, some of each presenting the 

 shades of colouration supposed to be characteristic of the other. 

 It is absolutely certain that so far as shade of colouring is 

 concerned, innotata cannot be maintained for a moment. 



But it may be said, at any rate, citrina has a well marked 

 white patch on the wing, and innotata has no trace even of 

 this. Surely this is sufficient to constitute a distinct species. 



Here, again, the extreme variability of G. citrina has to be 

 taken into account. From an abnormally large pure white 

 patch, the size of the last joint of a man's little finger, down to 

 a greyish white margin to a single feather of the coverts of 

 one wing, every intermediate amount of white on the wing be- 

 tween G. citrina and G. innotata is exhibited by our series. 



Even this does not exhaust the variability of the species. 

 In some the whole lower abdomen, vent, and lower tail-coverts 

 are pure white ; in a few the rich ferruginous tint continues 

 right down to the vent leaving nothing, but the lower tail- 

 coverts white, and even, these not pure, but with a faint orange 

 buff shade. In one specimen the entire half of the whole abdo- 

 men up to the breast is pure white ; on the other half of the 

 abdomen the ferruginous color descends half way to the 

 vent. 



If, after the above explanation, the result of the examination 

 of certainly the largest series ever collected in one place, Mr. 

 Seebohm still thinks fit to separate innotata as a distinct spe- 

 cies, I cannot, of course, cavil ; but nature has made no such 

 separation, and I must remind my readers that it is 



" Better to err with Tier than shine with Mm." 



In the above note Mr. Seebohm also speaks of Geocichla 

 layardiy as if this too were a good species ; but this has even 

 smaller claims to recognition than innotata. It has not even 

 the prima facie plausible distinction of an entire absence of 

 white on the wing, and as a matter of fact every Ceylou 

 Geocichla* of this type may be matched with an Indian 



* This bird, though doubtless rare in Ceylon, is by no means so rare as Major 

 Legge seems to think' I can at any rate add three more specimens to those he 

 mentions. 



