176 ContrihtUdm -to the 'OrnWiotog'y vf 'India', Sfc. 



obtain 'tliem in the winter answer exactly to Stricklnnd^s, while, 

 those somewhat bleached correspond perfectly with Blyth^s. 



The wing spot from the fourth to the ninth primaries^, which 

 I believe is what has mainly led to the separation of the two 

 species is easily explained ; only the perfect adult male exhibits 

 it. Young' birds of both sexes never shew the slightest trace of 

 it, and amongst the adult females, only perhaps one or two iu 

 twenty have a small yellowish white line, where the white patch 

 would be in the adult male. In the young birds of this as in other 

 species the breast feathers are more or less variegated with very 

 narrow crescentic brown bands. So long as any of these are 

 traceable, you may look in vain for the. white wing spot ; but 

 even after these have all disappeared, it is not until the line in 

 front and behind the eye becomes black, instead of blackish 

 brown, that you may expect to find the white wing bar cons- 

 picuous. Out of nine males, shewing no other sign of nonage 

 which I brought from Sindh, six only have the eye streak really 

 black j and all these exhibit the wing bar most distinctly ; of 

 the other three, with browner eye streaks, two shew only a trace, 

 and the third, no indication whatsoever of the wing bar. The 

 females never have the streak behind the eye as dark as in the 

 males, while of the continuation of that line in front of the eye 

 they exhibit only a trace. The young birds iu neither sex, so 

 long as the crescentic markings are pretty numerous on the 

 lower parts, shew much trace of the antiocular black spot, so 

 large and conspicuous in the perfect adult male. It may here 

 be noticed, that at Jeast two-thirds of the birds met with in 

 India in the cold season are young, the lower plumage more or 

 less varied, with crescentic lines ; of the remaining one-third at 

 least one-half are females, the remaining one-sixth only are 

 adult, or nearly adult males; of these agaiu about one-third 

 have not yet acquired the: throughly black eye stripe, or the 

 well marked white wing band ; in fact, it is only about one 

 in ■ every nine or ten birds that do clearly exhibit this charac- 

 teristic. The bird is very tame and will often allow you to 

 walk up within twenty yards of it, and scrutinise it carefully 

 with a pair of binoculars, and as in the live bird the white spot 

 is quite perceptible even when the wing is at rest (in dry skins 

 the secondaries almost always overlay it) I was able to procure 

 a much larger proportion with the white spot, than I could have 

 done had I merely shot them at random. 



Lord Walden remarks of arenar'ms that in the specimen 

 before him, " The centre pair of rectrices, at about one-third of 

 their length from the end display a well marked, irregular, light- 

 eolored transverse baud, a good .distinctive character if found to 



