100 A FIEST LIST OF THE 



can judge, define these races how you will, specimens can be 

 produced in regard to which it will always be doubtful whether 

 they should be referred to this or that species ; and not only this, 

 but while in certain localities doubtless only a single race is 

 to be procured, in certain other localities two or more of these 

 supposed species will be found associated together with numerous 

 intermediate forms. 



How cases like this are to be treated is a question which 

 becomes daily more and more important to Indian ornithologists, 

 as we collect together specimens from all parts of this vast empire. 

 This is a question which, owing to the limited collections existing 

 in Europe, does not appear to me to have been ever sufficiently 

 considered there ; and it would be a great boon to us if philo- 

 sophical naturalists at home would consider the subject in all its 

 bearings, and agree upon some intelligible rule by which we 

 might all be guided. I have elsewhere explained my views in 

 regard to this complex problem, but what I or other individual 

 colonial naturalists think or wish is of little consequence ; what is 

 wanted is something like a consensus amongst the leading 

 naturalists at home. The want of some recognized rule is 

 becoming a serious bar to scientific progress, and has a grave 

 tendency to discourage and disgust neophytes. 



Mr. Oates remarks in regard to the present birds : " Not 

 uncommon. I have procured it fifteen miles south, and twenty-five 

 miles east, of Thayetmyo. It has all the habits of the Common 

 King-crow. I saw, a few days ago, a family of them, — two adults 

 and three or four well-grown young ones ; this was at Tonyeh, 

 thirty miles south of Thayetmyo, on the 26th August. Specimens 

 that I measured varied as follows : — 



" Length, 10*6 to 11*5 ; expanse, 15*6 to 16*5 ; tail, from vent, 

 5'7 to 6; wing, 52 to 5*4; bill, from gape, l'l ; tarsus, 0*8 

 to 0-83. 



" In the adult the iris is scarlet ; the eyelids, grey ; bill, feet, 

 and claws, black; and the inside of the mouth, dusky fleshy. 

 In the young, the iris is wood brown ; the eyelids, smoky plum- 

 beous; the gape, fleshy; and the inside of the mouth, pale 

 fleshy/' 



282.— Chaptia senea, Vieil. 



Specimens from Thayetmyo are undistinguishable from Nil- 

 ghiri and Northern Indian birds. Captain Feilden gives the 

 length at from 8 to 8" 75. Mr. Oates says: "Not common. I 

 have only seen it a few times. A male measured : Length 8*85 ; 

 expanse, ]4'2; tail, from vent, 4*75; wing, 4" 75; bill, from 

 gape, 1*0; tarsus, - 62. 



" Iris, pinkish hazel ; eyelids, purplish grey ; bill, legs, feet, and 

 claws, black. 



