THE ISLANDS OF THE BAY OF BENGAL. 153 



several races. With affinis the case is different, it is a mere 

 pigmy compared with hirstitus, and weighs a little more than 

 half what this latter does. Its dimensions are as follow : — 



So far as color of soft parts and plumage are concerned, I 

 do not think that it is possible to specify any constant difference 

 between this and the preceding species ; in these respects 

 both are excessively variable, but as regards size the difference 

 is most conspicuous, and the largest female affinis, (and I have 

 now seen five,) is most conspicuously smaller than the smallest 

 male hirsutus. 



Davison says : — " On the 6th March, when returning from 

 shooting late in the evening at Camorta, I saw a bird fly off a 

 stump (that stood in some low secondary jungle) and hover in 

 front of a frond of a cocoanut palm, for about four or five seconds, 

 and then return to its original perch, from which it kept takino- 

 short circular flights, now sailing quietly along at about the 

 level of the top of its perch, then suddenly darting straight up 

 for eight or ten feet, and again swooping almost to the ground, 

 but always returning to the top of the stump ; twice it darted 

 perpendicularly up from its perch to the height of 15 or 20 

 feet, it was too dark to see what the bird was, and from the 

 way it was behaving I took it to be a Caprimulgus ; but on 

 shooting it I found it to be a very small Ninox ; it certainly did 

 not look bigger, if as big as C. Kelaarti, and was hawking in a 

 very similar fashion ; it was catching small moths, for I found 

 one in its mouth. This was the only one of this species that I 

 had an opportunity of observing ; another of the same species 

 was sent me by Mr. Homfray who got it from Dunnyleaf Creek, 

 South Andaman. The Nicobar bird proved on dissection to be 

 a female, and the Andaman one, a male." 



81 ter.— Ninox olbscurus, Hume. (2.) 



Two fine specimens of this handsome species, vide Stray 

 Feathers, 1873, p. 11, shot at Port Mouat, South Andaman, both 

 females, measured in the flesh as follows: — Length, 11-5 and 

 11-75; expanse 28 and 28*25 ; wing, 8*75 ; tail, b'12 and 5'25 ; 

 tarsus, 1-0 and 1*05 ; bill, from gape, 0*95 and 1-05; weio-ht 

 8 ozs., namely, about the same as hirsutus. 



The irides were yellow ; feet yellow ; claws black ; bill black- 

 ish ; cere and ridge of upper mandible and tip of lower 

 mandible green. 



