16 DIE PAPAGEIBN. 



wing- spot, and have the whole top, back, and sides of the head 

 a sort of lilac, browner generally on the sides, and with a more 

 or less distinct yellow ring- round the neck at the termination of 

 the lilac cap. In both sexes, the upper mandible is yellow, 

 varying- from a wax to a somewhat orange yellow, and lower 

 mandible, black or dusky. 



The quite young birds have the whole top and back of the 

 head dull green, rather darker than the back, contrasting with 

 the latter and indicating where the colored cap will ultimately 

 be ; both mandibles are in these pure wax yellow and even the 

 males want the red wing-spot. At an older stage the young males 

 are like the adult females ; at a little later stage, the lilac of the 

 head becomes slightly darker, a ruddy tinge begins to shew out 

 at the base of some of the feathers, a few of the feathers of the 

 forehead change to the same color as in the adult male, and the 

 place of the red wing-spot is marked by conspicuous orange tip- 

 pings to the feathers (Edwards, pi. 292.) 



The other species (which I will call bengalensls, Gmel.,) is 

 very similar in all its changes to the preceding, but in both 

 sexes the wing lining and axillaries are green. The female as 

 well as the male has the red wing-spot ; and this in both sexes 

 is a deeper and more maroon red than in the male of the pre- 

 ceding. 



The youngest birds I have yet seen had the red wing-spot 

 but I have no nestlings now by me of this species as I have of 

 the other. This species comes at any rate from Sikhim, Dacca, 

 and Eastern Bengal generally, Assam, and Upper Burmah, as 

 from all these localities I have specimens now before me. 



I do not entertain the smallest doubt that Dr. Einsch is in 

 error in uniting these two forms ; but be this as it may, he is 

 unquestionably wrong here as elsewhere, in asserting that the 

 adults of both sexes are alike. 



This assertion is founded on one specimen, sexed as a female 

 (and wrongly sexed, if it has a peach bloom colored head) in the 

 " Museum Heineanum " and on sundry specimens exhibiting 

 the change from the female plumage (which the young male 

 assumes when about a year old) to that of the adult male ! 



We are told that " Alas ! the Indian ornithologists give us no 

 satisfactory answer to many of the most difficult questions. 

 Jerdon only says, that the female has a blue head and that the 

 the young ai-e green." 



But what more would Dr. Finsch have ? Who could foresee 

 his particular idiosyncracy ? When Pavo cristatus is mentioned, 

 who thinks of writing an essay to prove that the hen does not 

 normally assume the gaudy plumage of the cock ? Does he 



