BIRDS OF UPPER PEGU. 191 



tinged with the slightest possible suspicion of fulvous on the 

 following parts : — 



" The head and anterior half of neck, the back, and scapulars. 



" Feathers on head erectile, but not forming a conspicuous crest. 



" The dimensions would do for Bubulcus coromandus, but this in 

 summer plumage is a very different bird. They are too small 

 for H. garzetta, which moreover has the bill (according to Jerdon) 

 black at all seasons. The Thayetmyo bird, of which hundreds 

 may be seen in the cantonment, is a bird colored as I have 

 described during the summer months, and with a yellow bill 

 varying in intensity in different individuals/'' 



Looking to dimensions and to the black feet, this should be 

 melanopus. The bill seems too long, the wings and tail short for 

 coromandus, and then in August this latter ought to exhibit its 

 conspicuous golden buff plumage; on the other hand, I am 

 not aware that melanopus ever exhibits even a slight fulvous 

 tinge, nor that the bill is yellow all through the year ! 



Without specimens further speculation is useless. The bird 

 is certainly not garzetta, but it may be neither coromandus nor 

 melanopus. 



931.— Butorides javanicus, Borsf. 



Thayetmyo specimens are somewhat differently colored to 

 Indian ones. The sides and back of the neck are more tawny, 

 the back is more bronzed, and the head and crest with, I think, a 

 slightly brighter metallic gloss, and that though the specimens 

 sent were shot in winter. I do not know that they could be 

 considered distinct (though the tarsi also seem to run longer) ; 

 but still, if the differences I have pointed out are constant, the 

 Pegu birds constitute a distinguishable race. 



Mr. Oates remarks : " This little Bittern is common in the 

 Engmah Swamp, living in the thick brushwood on its banks. The 

 irides are yellow ; naked skin, green, duller on the eyelids ; inside 

 of mouth, fleshy salmon-colored; upper mandible, black, with 

 a small streak of green below the nares ; gape, greenish brown ; 

 lower mandible, gx-eenish yellow, more or less black along the 

 edges ; legs and feet, green, except front of tarsus and ridge of 

 toes, which are brownish; claws, horny; soles, tinged with 

 orange." 



932. — Ardetta flavicollis, Latham. 



Mr. Oates remarks : " The Black Bittern is pretty plentiful 

 in swamps in the plains, and in the hills every nullah in the 

 Evergreen Forests contained one or more of these birds. 



" Males measured as follows: — Length, 23 to 23*4 ; expanse, 

 29 to 30-8; tail, from vent, 27 to 2'8; wing, 8-1 to 8-3; bill, 

 from gape, 4 to 4*2; tarsus, 2-9. 



