10 A FIRST LIST OF THE 



blue and yellow clays, gravel or whitish sand, and is clothed with 

 tree jungle, more or less thick, according to the nature of the soil. 

 There is everywhere an undergrowth of grass, or bulbous plants ; 

 the grass in favorable localities often eight or ten feet in height. 

 " The size of the trees varies much with locality and the dis- 

 tance from Thayetmyo, as the Burmese are always cutting and 

 burning, and seldom let trees grow to any size. There are a 

 great many patches of jungle partially cultivated with the bare 

 trunks of the old forest trees still standing ; the trees are chiefly 

 Teak, and Eng } with an immense quantity of small-sized bamboo." 



III. 



And now to return to our birds. Altogether, including all the 

 species obtained or observed by Captain Feilden, Mr. Oates, and 

 Mr. Blandford, I can as yet only enumerate 317 species. This 

 must appear a very small number, but it must always be borne 

 in mind, that this list refers strictly to the limited area already 

 defined. Directly you cross the Sittang and proceed eastwards, 

 directly you cross our southern line and leave dry Upper for 

 moist Lower Pegu, or again directly you wander any distance 

 westwards from the Irrawaddy, you at once meet with numerous 

 species not included in our list. 



Still, even making all these allowances, I do not doubt that, 

 including stragglers, this little block of diy, hilly country (say 

 100 miles square, or 10,000 square miles in extent) will, when 

 thoroughly explored, yield at least 500 species. 



As it is, it yields quite as many, looking to its extent, as any 

 other division of British Burmah, so far as I am yet acquainted 

 with them. In Tenasserim I can only count 435; in Lower Pegu, 

 298; in Arracan, 270 species. Out of these, Tenasserim has 190 

 species not included in this list ; Lower Pegu, 30 not included 

 in either; and Arracan, 58 not as yet included in any of my 

 lists. Many of these will doubtless be found to extend beyond 

 the limits that my imperfect information at present enables 

 me to assign to them; but at any rate, so far as I have 

 yet investigated the question, I can only count altogether 595 

 species, or say 600, which I actually know to occur in British 

 Burmah. To these I might add about 100, which, I am sure, 

 will prove to occur there, and which may have been sent thence, 

 though I have no record of the fact. 



But what are 700 species for a country stretching over ten 

 degrees of latitude, with a myriad-isled archipelago, vast rivers 

 and swamps, and the most wonderful diversity of soil, geological 

 formation, physical configuration and level, vegetation and climate? 



We may safely estimate the Ornis of this rich, but too little- 

 utilized and only half-explored, country at one thousand species ; 

 and I entertain no doubt that twenty-five years hence some future 



