430 Notes on some Cei/lo-nese Birds. 



bird, and therefore I confine my remarks to that from Ceylon. 

 Of the Himahiyan species T have very numerous specimens from 

 all parts of the Himalayas^ from Darjeeling'to Murree. All are one 

 and the same species, identical in every respect, thong-h individuals 

 differ considerably in size, and in the tone of coloring above and 

 below. In every one of these the disc of the eye is precisely 

 similarly colored; I have thirteen specimens before me uow^ and 

 have carefully examined at least double that number, and I there- 

 fore speak with g-reat confidence on this point. 



The whole of the central portion of the eye disc is black 

 or nearly so, as are also the shafts and central portions of 

 the long-, bristle-like, anti-ocular feathers ; the lateral portions 

 of these, especially towards their bases, being' g-reyish. Prom 

 near the base of the bill a bi'oad, pure white, band extends over 

 the eye as far as the posterior angle; beyond this, outside the 

 blackish central ring, the eye disc, behind and under the eye, to 

 the gape, is a pale, fulvous brown, narrowly and obsoletely barred 

 with darker brown. I am very particular about this, because 

 anything more absolutely and utterly unlike the natural bird 

 than Fig. XIV., Gr. & M. Gen. of Birds, of Syrnium neivarense, 

 Hodg., so far as the eye discs are concerned, it is absolutely im- 

 possible to conceive. What the artist was thinking of I cannot 

 guess, the picture fails to convey the faintest idea of what the 

 eye disc is really like. 



When we turn to the Ceylon bird, it is not merely that the 

 bird is much smaller, (a fine male before me having the wing 

 barely 13 inches) ; that the ground color of the under-surface, and 

 specially of the tibial and tarsal plumes, is more rufous; that the 

 whole upper surface, but specially the head and nape are paler 

 and of a more rufescent olive brown, and that the scapulars, 

 tertiaries, and coverts are much more banded ; but the eye disc 

 differs toto ccelo. The anti-ocular bristles are not half the length, 

 the dark ring immediatel}^ round the eye is not half so broad, 

 the white eye-brow does not extend so far back, and is tinged 

 with fulvous, while the whole of the rest of the outside of the 

 eye disc from the termination of the white eye-brow, a little 

 behind the centre of the upper margin of the eye, right round 

 to where, near the gape, it meets the anti-ocular bristles, is a rick 

 ochreous huff, utterly unspotted and unbarred. 



No one who has ever seen the two birds could possibly mistake 

 them for one moment. 



The question arises can this bird be Sykes^ indranee ? Could he 

 possibly have overlooked this most conspicuous, rich, ochi-aceous 

 crescent? It is the very first feature in the bird's plumage that 

 would strike the most careless observer^ and yet there is no allusion 



