BIRDS OF TENASSERIM. « 187 



Pegu is a mere network of the mouths of the Irrawaddy, and 

 it is not till you round the corner at Cape Negrais, that you 

 get real pure sea again, and not till then that you again meet 

 with this pretty species. Such at least is my present theory, 

 and I propound it tamquam valeat. 



This species has no special breeding plumage ; this we can 

 pretty confidently assert, having obtained it at all seasons. 



The following are dimensions, &c, recorded in the flesh : — 



Males. — Length, 512 to 5'4; expanse, 8*12 to 8'fi2; tail from 

 vent, 1-75 to 2-0; wing, 2'5 to 275; tarsus, 0*62 to 0'65 ; 

 bill from gape, 075 to - 8 ; weight, - 4 to 0*5 oz. 



Females. — Length, 4*75 to 5-12; expanse, 7*9 to 8"12 ; tail 

 from vent, 1-5 to 175 ; wing, 2'37 to 25 ; tarsus, 0-55 to 062 ; 

 bill from gape, 07 to 0-8. 



Colors of the soft parts are variable ; the legs and feet are 

 generally a dark sap green, or dirty green, with the feet slight- 

 ly lighter colored, and the soles pale yellowish green, but the 

 feet have sometimes a yellowish tinge, and are sometimes orange, 

 barely tinged with green, and with the soles a clear orange ; 

 the claws are generally green ; the bill is dark horny brown, in 

 some nearly black ; the gape orange; the irides vary most of 

 all — equally in both sexes and killed at the same season, — from 

 light red to dark brown. Neither does this appear to be due 

 to age, as we have some clearly adult full-plumaged males, with, 

 light red irides. 



The male has the lores, cheeks, ear-coverts and sides of the 

 head behind the eye dull yellow olive; a narrow metallic puce- 

 colored stripe from the base of the lower mandible on either 

 side right to the breast ; the chin and rest of the space enclosed 

 between these two stripes pale reddish brown ; forehead, crown, 

 occiput, nape, sides of the neck behind the olivaceous face patch, 

 entire interscapulaiy region, and all but the longest scapulars, me- 

 tallic green, glossed with pinkish purple ; lesser and some of the 

 median wing coverts, rump and upper tail-coverts metallic vio- 

 let, glossed with purple or puce color ; median coverts and 

 longer scapulars ferruginous olive ; quills and greater coverts dull 

 hair brown ; primaries excessively narrowly, secondaries and 

 tertiaries and their greater coverts more broadly, margined with 

 olive yellow ; breast and entire rest of lower parts clear yellow, 

 shaded with olive on the flanks and sides, and sometimes a little 

 on the breast ; edge of the wing brown ; wing-lining white, 

 tinged brownish towards the edge of the wing, and faintly with 

 olive elsewhere ; tail feathers hair brown, blackish on the 

 central ones, and on the outer webs of the next two or three 

 pairs, and all these like the central ones more or less margined 

 metallic on the outer webs, dull blue in most lights, a little 

 greenish in some. 



