BIRDS OF UPPER PEGU. 79 



203.— Cuculus micropterus, Gould. 



Specimens from Pegu are identical with the bird that we call 

 micropterus, Gould ; a perfectly distinct species common through- 

 out Lower and Eastern Bengal, and even up into the lower valleys 

 of the Himalayas in Sikhim, Bhootan, and Assam, and distin- 

 guished at once from saturates of Hodgson, which I identify with 

 striates, Drapiez, by its huge bill, which is fully as large as that 

 of Hierococcyx sparveroides. 



Mr. Oates says that this species is " common everywhere, but 

 less so in the plains than in the hills ; its note is double and very 

 melodious, and answers well to that described by Colonel Tytler 

 in the Ibis for 1868. It generally selects the topmost bough of 

 a tree — a dead one by preference — and remains calling there for a 

 quarter of an hour or more. A male I shot measured : Length, 

 I3'3; expanse, 23'5 ; tail, from vent, 7; wing, 8'25 ; bill, from 

 gape, 1*35; tarsus, - 92. A female measured: Length, 12*4; 

 expanse, 21; tail, from vent, 62; wing, 7' 6; bill, from gape, 

 1-3 ; tarsus, 089. 



" The irides are rich brown ; the eyelids, greenish plumbeous ; 

 the edges, swollen and deep yellow ; the inside of the mouth, fleshy 

 red ; gape, yellow ; a small portion of the upper mandible under 

 the nostril, and the greater portion of the lower mandible, dull 

 green ; the remainder of the bill, blackish horny ; legs, a soft, 

 deep, yellow ; claws, dark horny/'' 



It will be observed that the male is the species referred to by 

 Jerdon, No. 204, Vol. I, p. 328, as Cuculus striatus, Drapiez, and 

 which, if it were distinct, would stand as affinis, Hay ; while the 

 female is the bird referred to by Jerdon as No. 203, Cuculus mi- 

 cropterus. These two numbers, 203 and 204, are the two sexes 

 of the same species. It will be observed that I consider that the 

 smaller-billed bird which says " Kyj)kul-puk/ia" (or " the Kyphul 

 fruit is ripe "), which has been called saturatus by Hodgson, and 

 liimalayanus by Vigors and Blyth, and which we got at the 

 Nicobars and heard at the Andamans, is the true striatus of 

 Drapiez; while the huge-billed bird which says " Bho-kutha-kho" 

 is, I assume, to stand as micropterus. The true synonomy of 

 these species is, and may perhaps always remain, somewhat 

 doubtful ; anyhow, it will be understood that the Pegu birds are 

 the large-billed ones. 



I ought here to notice that Captain Feilden mentions having 

 killed two specimens of a Bay-banded Cuckoo, answering fairly 

 well to Jerdon's description of Cuculus sonnerati, but measur- 

 ing only 8 inches in length. This was at the beginning of the 

 rains ; later he procured two more in November, one of which 

 contained a nearly perfect bluish grey egg. This may have been 

 the hepatic stage of tenuirostris, but I hardly think so, as 



