382 BIRDS OCCURRING IN INDIA NOT DESCRIBED 



at all, but the breast covered with more or less distinct small 

 bars of brown, which occupy the tip of each feather ; the 

 flanks deepening into rust-colour ; the under tail-coverts dusky- 

 brown, washed with rufous and lined down the centre with 

 shaft stripes of buff; bill horn-brown, paler on the lower 

 mandible; feet horn-brown. Total length, 9 '8 inches; culmen, 

 0*7 ; wing, 4'9 ; tail, 4-1 ; tarsus, 1*35. 



Macgillivray gives the following account of the progress of 

 the young towards maturity : — " After the first moult, which 

 commences in September, and is completed by the end of 

 November, the plumage of the males is in some almost uniform- 

 ly brownish black, while in others the foreneck, and espe- 

 cially the breast, are more or less lunulated with light brown 

 and grey. In all, the auricular coverts are brownish black, 

 without light coloured shafts, which is never the case in the 

 young females.'" 



The young male birds of the year, though in black plumage, 

 may always be told by their blackish bill ; thus it is that we 

 see some specimens, apparently fully adult, with the latter 

 black. There can, we think, be no doubt that when once this 

 bill has became yellow it never changes, only deepening into a 

 fine orange as the bird gets older. On examining these black- 

 billed specimens it will also be observed that the black plu- 

 mage is more or less shaded with brownish, and even in some 

 yellow-billed birds this shade is apparent, showing that 

 fine silky black plumage is only assumed by the very old bird. — 

 Dresser, " Birds of Europe.''' 



372 ter.— Oreocincla spiloptera, Bly. 



Length about eight inches and a half ; of wing four inches, 

 and tail three and a quarter ; bill to gape above an inch, and 

 tarsi and inch and a quarter. Colour uniform rich olive brown 

 above, inclining to tawny ; below white, with black spots near- 

 ly resembling those of the Missel Thrush ; middle of throat, lower 

 abdomen, vent and lower tail-coverts, spotless ; wing-coverts 

 black, margined more or less with the hue of the back, and each 

 conspicuously tipped with a pure white spot; bill blackish 

 and very robust ; the tarsi brown and slender. Inhabits 

 Ceylon.— Blyth, J. A. 8. B. } 1847, 142. 



