71 



fTHE BIRDS OF BANGKOK. 



By W. J. F. WILLIAMSON. 



iNTRODUCTfoN. 



In the last number of the Journal, I published a Preliminary 

 List of the Birds of Bangkok, and stated that, with the present 

 number, I hoped to commence a serial paper giving some account of 

 the appearance, habits, etc., of the birds of this locality. 



Comparatively little has been done, up to the present, in the 

 way of a systematic study of the birds of Siam. A few local collections 

 have been made and some papers issued, the earliest, of which I have 

 any record, being Capt. Stanley S. F\owev's Birds of a Bamjkol: Garden^ 

 published in The This m the late nineties of the last century. This 

 includes 28 birds only, and is of very slight value. The same may be 

 said of the list of Siamese birds, numbering 75 species (some of them 

 unidentified), given in an appendix to Mr. H. Warington Smj'th's 

 Five Years in Siam, published in 1898. The only part of the country 

 which has been worked with any degree of thoroughness is the western 

 portion of Siamese Malaya, from Trang southward. In 1908 and 1909, 

 this district was visited by Messrs. Robinson and Kloss, of the 

 Federated Malay States Museums, who published in The Ihis, in 

 1910-11. a paper giving a complete list of all the birds obtained or 

 observed by them or their collectors.* The paper in question, which 

 enumerates some 270 species, is the most important cotitribution yet 

 made to our knowledge of Siamese avifauna. It is to be remarked, 

 however, that the area covered by these contributors includes, not only 

 Trang, but also the adjacent Langkawi group of Islands, together with 

 I'erlis and the northern portion of the State of Kedah as far south as 

 the mouth of the Kedah river. These places were all Siamese territory 

 at the time they were visited, but, before the paper w\as issued, a large 

 part of the area mentioned had passed under British protection by 



*As stated by Messrs. Kohinsoii and KloisS, Trang liad been pievioiisly 

 visited in 1896, 1897 and 1899, by Dr. W. L. Abbott, tlie well-known 

 American naturalist, who formed a niagniHcent collection of bird-skins. Untor- 

 tuiiately, however, no full accoutu of this has ever been issued, ihougii a few 

 species have been described. 



