BIRDS OF TENASSERIM. 55 



perhaps, notwithstanding the exteme narrowness of its bill, and 

 short wings, belong to the other form (which it closely resem- 

 bles) as it has the bill 1* 33 in length, whereas in the other 

 three specimens the bills are only 1 05, l'l, and 1*2 in length. 



"Setting aside this possibly doubtful specimen, I have three 

 specimens, at any rate, of typical affinis, all shot in the 

 neighbourhood of Malacca. Wings 4*28, 4*5, and 4*6, with 

 tails 4-4 and 4-5, answering in every respect to Blyth's 

 description, and which, in my opinion, no one who compares 

 them with either type or description can possibly doubt to be 

 the form described by Blyth as affinis. 



" I have also before me four chestnut castaneus, wings, 5*2, 

 5*25, 5-25, and 55. It seems to me that this difference in size 

 alone is sufficient to separate the two ; castaneus is really more 

 than double the bulk of affinis, but the whole character and 

 color of the plumage is also totally different. The plumage in 

 affinis is of the same color and character as that of javanensis, 

 apud Blyth, and both are clearly different to any practised eye 

 from that of castaneus. The plumage of this latter is softer and 

 silkier, and the chestnut is brighter everywhere (but most 

 conspicuously so on the throat and breast) in the dullest 

 castaneus than in the brightest javanensis or affinis. 



"I say nothing now of the grey white mottled birds from 

 Malacca, and the similar, though immediately distinguishable, 

 ones from the Himalayas. I assert nothing as to the validity of 

 Blyth's affinis, nor as to the correct name that this or javanensis, 

 apud Blyth, should bear. 



u I merely assert that in the Malayan Peninsula occur two 

 forms, a larger and a smaller (both fully represented in my 

 museum), agreeing alike with the descriptions and the types of 

 javanensis* and affinis, Blyth, and both absolutely and unmis- 

 takably distinct, and distinguishable at a glance from castaneus. 



" Secondly as to punctatus and moniliger. I have moniliger 

 both from the Travancore Hills and from Ceylon perfectly 

 identical. In no adult moniliger does the wing fall short of 4*7. 

 In punctatus, on the other hand, of which several specimens 

 have now, Mr White informs me, been obtained, the wing 

 appears to be always under 4 - 5 (in the type it is only 4'3), 

 and though unquestionably there is a strong family resemblance 

 between the males of moniliger as sexed by Mr Bourdillion 

 (for I have no really reliably-sexed specimens except hisj and 

 punctatus as described (I have not yet seen the rufous form of 

 this), the difference between the two birds in every dimension 

 and even in plumage is such that no one who compares them 

 can ever confound the two/' 



* B y types of javanensis I mean the specimens labelled with this name by Blyth 

 himself. 



