FURTIIER ADDITIONS TO THE SINDH AVIFAUNA. 115 



the birds of Persia. Directly I showed St. John this specimen, 

 without mentioning" name or anything ahout it, he at once 

 said, " This is the bird I got at Bushire that Blanford would 

 not believe about." 



The occurrence of this species at Dowlutpore near Sehwan 

 17° further east than Bushire, along with four other species, 

 Lanius auriculatus, Saxicola leucomela, Emberiza 7niliaria, and 

 Linaria cannabina, none of which have hitherto been observed 

 anything nearly so far east, must naturally awaken suspicions 

 that some mistake has occurred. 



1 have examined the specimen of mesoleuca carefully, and it 

 is certainly not one prepared in Europe, and the same may be 

 said of all the other specimens from Dowlutpore. They are 

 obviously prepared by a comparatively untrained native skinner, 

 and it would seem impossible that Mr. Murray's man, out in the 

 jungles at Dowlutpore, could have got the specimens in any 

 possible way, except by himself shooting and skinning them ; 

 and as he has not the slightest knowledge of ornithology, and 

 barely knows a Crow from a Pigeon, there would seem no valid 

 reason for doubting the occurrence of this and the other species, 

 startling and unexpected as this is. 



But is it quite certain that these specimens were amongst 

 the Dowlutpore birds ? Mr. Murray thinks so, and he may 

 be right ; but not one of these birds had a ticket, and I have 

 ascertained that about the time he got the birds from 

 Dowlutpore, he also had to examine a collection of birds from 

 Bushire. And all these five birds occur at Bushire ; so that 

 it appears to me that with a lot of birds lying about without 

 tickets, it is not impossible that these five being Bushire ones 

 got mixed with the Dowlutpore ones, and therefore, while 

 admitting these species provisionally to places in our list, I 

 must warn my readers that I think their occurrence within our 

 limits requires further confirmation. 



Mr. Murray sent me this bird as R. pkmnicura, from which 

 it differs most conspicuously by its huge white wing spot ; but 

 Captain Butler, who is far better up in birds, pronounced it, like 

 Major St. John, to be apparently R. hodgsoni, which indeed it 

 much resembles. 



As regards its differences from R. pfiosnicura, Mr. Dresser 

 remarks : — 



u The Adult Male differs from the male of R. pftcenicura 

 in having the upper parts, more especially the head, much 

 darker ; the white on the forehead more extended ; the black ou 

 the throat more intense ; and the entire under parts below the 

 throat are rich orange-red — the centre of the abdomen alone 

 being marked with white; the wings are darker aud greyer, 



