226 CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE ORNITHOLOGY OF INDIA. 



appear on one or both cheeks, and one or two bright red feathers 

 have appeared amongst the pale dingy orange red tail coverts. 

 In the next month a further advance is made, and by the end of 

 October or the beginning of November the birds are nearly in 

 full plumage. 



469. — Irena puella Latham, (45.) 



Specimens from the Andamans are precisely identical with 

 others from Anjango, slopes of the Nilghiris, and Sikhim. We 

 never observed this species in the Nicobars. 



Davison says : — " The fairy blue-bird is far from uncommon 

 on Mount Harriet and other places in the immediate neighbour- 

 hood of Port Blair, but is somewhat less so on the other islands 

 of the Andaman group that I visited ; I did not observe it at 

 the Nicobars, on either of the Cocos, or on Table Island. 

 "Where it does occur, it keeps generally in small parties frequent- 

 ing the tops of the higher trees, uttering from time to time 

 its sharp clear call ; occasionally it may be seen among the 

 undergrowth of the jungle. The females seem to preponderate 

 over the males in a remarkable degree, and for every male 

 you see, you meet with at least four or five females. They 

 breed at the Andamans, and the young were out in April. 

 The young male has at first the garb of the female, which 

 gradually changes to that of the adult male by moulting.'" 



They appear to be permanent residents ; at any rate we have 

 obtained them from December to September. 



A young male has many gi-een feathers intermingled with 

 the black of the chin, throat, and breast, while the feathers 

 of the head, back, and rump, are green, only narrowly tipped 

 with shining blue. 



471 bis.-— Oriolus andamanensis Tytler. (76.) 



This very distinct species was only met with by us on the 

 Southern Andaman and at Macpherson's Straits. We secured 

 forty specimens, and have had 36 more sent to us, it being 

 excessively common where it does occur. It belongs to the 

 black naped sub-division of yellow orioles, and may readily 

 be distinguished from indicns of Southern India by the 

 almost entire absence of the yellow edgings to the secondaries and 

 tertiaries, by its somewhat smaller size, by the greater extent 

 of yellow on the tail, and by its narrower occipital black band. 



The following are the dimensions recorded in the flesh 

 from a large series of adults ; the sexes do not vary in size : — 



Length, 9'5 to 10-25; expanse, 15*25 to 16-75; wing, 

 5'25 to o-4- ; tail, from vent, 3'75 to 4'25 ; tarsus, 0'9 to 0*95; 



