OF THE ANDAMAN ISLANDS. 493 



" Wing, 4-75 inches ; tail, 2-37 ; tarsus, 1*0 ; middle toe, with 

 nail, 1*12; bill, from nostril (in a straight line), 0*65. 



" Two examples of this small plain-colored Scops Owl were 

 obtained near Port Blair, South Andaman, by Captain R. 

 Wimberley." 



Looking to the very small size and to the description, so far 

 as it is possible to follow a description of such a bird, I am 

 quite disposed to admit this as a good species. 



I have unfortunately never seen a specimen, and considering 

 how many E. Balli have recently been obtained, it is curious 

 that no more modestus should yet have turned up. Another 

 thing worthy of notice is, that the young of Balli approach, to 

 judge by the description, very closely to modestus in plumage, 

 but they have the wings 5*5. 



103 ter.— Collocalia innominata, Hume. 



Lord Walden, I see, unites this species, Jerdon's unicolor, and 

 spodiopggia, Peale, apud nos, under the one general name of 

 francica, Grm. When he was about it he had better, as Captain 

 G. F. L. Marshall recently suggested to me, have united all the 

 known Collocalias into one comprehensive species, omnium- 

 gatherum, Walden. I may be wrong in the nomenclature. 

 Jerdon's unicolor ought very possibly to stand under some other 

 name; my innominata should, it may be, bear some other prior 

 title ; and my spodiopygia may not be Peale's, and should per- 

 chance stand as inexpectata, nobis, or again bear some other 

 title, but the three species, whatever their proper names, are as 

 distinct as Oriolus, kundoo, chinensis, and melanocephalus,na,y more 

 so, for they differ extraordinarily in size, and any ordinarily ob- 

 servant child of eight years of age would pick them out of a 

 heap, at once, as distinct. 



It is quite clear that Lord Walden has not seen the birds, or 

 he could never possibly have fallen into the error of confound- 

 ing together three such exceedingly different species. 



110 bis. — Caprimulgus andamanicus, Hume. 



Specimens subsequently received leave no doubt as to the 

 distinctness of this species. Lord Walden, w T ho calls it macrurus, 

 admits that "it may claim to be regarded as belonging to a 

 distinct species/' He omits to notice that four months previ- 

 ously I had characterized and named it. He gives the wings 

 of five specimens as varying from 7 to 7 "13, and the tails from 

 5-25 to 5-5. 



