424 THE LACCADIVES AND THE WEST COAST. 
and at St. George’s Island, are typical* intermedia, very dark 
in general colour, and with conspicuous slatey rumps. 
Nowhere was a single Collocalia to be seen. In the Upper 
Wooded portions of the island the Black-naped Azure Fly-catcher 
(M. azurea), the Indian White-Eyed Tit (7. palpebrosa), the 
Indian Oriole (O. kundoo), and the Indian Koil (£. honorata), 
were tolerably common, and we also shot a single Malabar 
Green Pigeon (O. malabaricus), but beyond these, the eagles 
and the Blue Rocks, not a single bird was seen. There were 
no Crows, no Kites, no Mainahs, probably because the 90 or 109 
odd Eagles that inhabit the island, make it too hot for these 
smaller robbers. 
I believe that no other similar breeding place of this Sea 
Eagle is known to exist, at any rate, within the limits of the 
British Empire in Asia—I know now of a great many localities 
where one or even two pairs have for years nested, but this is 
the only large Colony of which I have ever heard. 
It is not difficult to understand why this island should 
have attracted these birds. It is in the midst of deep sea, 
literally swarming with sea snakes; it is miles away from land, 
and there being nothing there to attract visitors, neither cocoa- 
nuts, nor birds’ nests, nor turtles, nor sea birds’ eggs, and it. 
being, even in fine weather, rather difficult to land on, no one 
I believe ever visits it. It is high and perpendicular sided, and 
bears on its summit huge trees suitable alike for nesting pur- 
poses, and as watch-towers, from which prey can be watched 
for and pounced down upon. If only a single pair settled 
there, at first, advantages like these, perfect safety and an 
abundant supply of food would necessarily lead to the estab- 
lishment of a growing Colony, the growth of which might 
only be limited by the supply of food. I procured some 15 
specimens, and [ killed 6 or 7 more which fell down into in- 
accessible portions of the cliffs, and I left, as far as I could 
judge, from 70 to 80 birds, old and young, on the island. If 
some one re-visits the island a few years hence, it will be in- 
teresting to ascertain whether the colony, which when we 
* Lord Walden recently remarked: “ Mr. Hume speaks of typical Turtur tigrina 
from Sumatra. As the species was not described from a Sumatran individual, it is 
difficult to gather what is meant by the expression typical.” By typical I desire to sig- 
nify an example exhibiting in their highest development, the peculiar characteristics 
of the species. Columba intermedia was certainly not described from a West Coast 
Island individual, yet amongst a very large series obtained in all parts of the Empire, 
the Pigeons of these islands are amongst the most typical, 7. ¢., have the characters by 
which intermedia differs from livia most pronounced. So too of all the specimens of 
tigrina that I have seen from Burmah and Malayana, those from Sumatra, are 
amongst those that exhibit in the most marked degree those peculiarities which 
constitute the specific difference between suratensis and tigrina, and therefore I call 
them typical. But chacun selon son gout. 
