NOVELTIES. 447 



a conspicuous torque, half broken through in the centre by a 

 little projection of the white of the throat into it ; below this 

 torque the sides of the neck and entire lower parts, including 

 wing lining, are pale buff ; the centre of the abdomen and vent 

 feathers much paler, almost white ; the red brown of the occiput 

 shades into the rich bright rufous olive of the entire mantle ; 

 the quills are hair brown; the secondaries narrowly tipped 

 with yellowish white, and with the outer webs, and the tertiaries, 

 with the greater part of both webs, strongly tinged or overlaid 

 with the color of the mantle ; the outer webs of the pri- 

 maries similarly tinged, but margined with a much paler and 

 more rufescent shade, almost rufescent white in some, on the 

 terminal halves ; the tail is pale brown obsoletely barred and tinged, 

 most strongly so on the basal half, with rufescent olive; 

 each feather tipped for about quarter of an inch with white ; 

 the tail is very much graduated ; the feathers respectively 

 fall short of the central pair by 0*3, 0'5, 09, 1*2 and 1-7 ; the 

 fifth and sixth quills are equal and longest, the first four fall short 

 of them respectively by - 2, 0*4, 0*9 and 1"5. On the lower 

 surface the quills are a rich glossy hair brown, margined on 

 the inner webs with a sort of creamy buff. 



Proparus dubius, Hume. Pro. A. S.B., May 1st, 



1874 



Forehead rufescent ; head and nape a rich rufous olive brown ; a white 

 line from the top of the eye over the ear-coverts surmounted by a black 

 line extending right round the base of the nape; chin, throat, breast and 

 middle of abdomen uniform pale rufescent. 



This last bird I described with some hesitation; it is a 

 Leiotricliine form, allied to Minla and Proparus, but distinct 

 from all known species, I believe, of this group. My reason 

 for doubt is this. In some particulars it closely resembles Mr. 

 Mandelli's Minla rufogularis, (Stray Feathers, Vol. 1, p. 

 416), but it is longer, has a smaller wing, entirely wants 

 the rusty red throat, and the black and white bands continued 

 over the forehead, which bands in our bird do not extend further 

 forward than the middle of the eye. In other respects Mr. 

 Mandelli's description would apply fairly well. Could it be 

 that my bird is the female, rufogularis the male ? Amongst 

 the species comprised in the various subgenera, which may all 

 be included in the genus Leiothrlv, there are never very marked 



