ASSAM, SYLHET AND CACHAR. 95 



The Manipur birds are full sized. Wings in four males 70 

 to 7'3 ; in five females, from 6'8 to 7*1. 



We have this species from N.-E, Cachar, Shillong and the 

 Khasi hills and various localities in the Dibrugarh district, and 

 Godwin- Austen includes it in his Dafla hill list, but here my 

 record as regards Assam, Cachar and Sylhet, for the pre- 

 sent, ends. 



[Fairly common in Dibrugarh, frequenting well-wooded and 

 open country, and even the scanty shrubs on the Brahmaputra 

 churs.— J. R. C] 



Throughout British Burmah it is widely distributed. 



271«er.— Pericrocotus elegans, McClell. 



Pretty common in the Western, rare in the Eastern hills, and 

 in the basin only observed in the low-wooded mounds near the 

 bases of the Southern and Eastern hills. 



At the Jhiri I got one abnormal specimen, apparently an adult 

 male, but with the red everywhere replaced by a beautiful uni- 

 form orange, far brighter and more yellow than fiatnmeus even. 



The colour is not patchy, as in young birds, changing 

 to the adult, but uniform and pure, and all the black parts 

 are glossy and in perfect order. There is no red on either 

 web of the central tail-feathers, and there is no red on 

 the first three primaries. It is not^/Zctwrneus, for that has no 

 red on the first four primaries, and it is moreover a redder 

 orange than this bird. As a young male of elegans it is 

 all right to have the first three primaries unmarked (the adult 

 has only two such), also to have no red on the tail-fea- 

 thers, for this only comes with the perfect plumage. But 

 then I have seen hundreds and have before me some thirty 

 young elegans, and yet never saw before one with this 

 uniform gorgeous orange tint — about the colour, if my me- 

 mory serves me correctly, of Chrysoenas victor ? There is 

 no known Pericrocotus of this colour. Is it a mere sport, 

 or is there by chance an undiscriminated species in the 

 East here ? Godwin-Austen gives fiammeus from the Khasi 

 hills, where of course the true fiammeus does not occur. 

 Can the bird he thus identified have been one like mine ? 



I have elegans from N.-E. Cachar and from Sadiya and 

 many parts of the Dibrugarh district, but, strange to say, 

 no specimens from Shillong or the Khasi hills. Godwin- 

 Austen records both speciosus and fiammeus from the Khasi 

 hills ; the former was probably really elegans (when his first list 

 was published the Pericrocoti had not been properly discri- 

 minated), and the latter either elegans, or, if there be 



