364 NOTES ON CEYLONESE ORNITHOLOGY AND OOLOGY, 



(this is concealed by the upper tail-coverts), remainder blackish 

 brown, mottled to within two inches of the tip with greyish ; 

 a little above the subterminal band is an indication of a narrow 

 band or bar ; the tips of all the feathers are tipped with fulvous 

 grey ; beneath, the neck and breast, together with the flanks 

 isabelline or reddish grey, with white mesial lines and buff 

 grey tips ; the elongated abdominal feathers are whitish clouded 

 and mottled with darkish grey ; under tail-coverts white, 

 washed with light tawny. 



The habits of this bird, which died at 6 months in my 

 aviary from an accident, were very interesting ; from the very 

 first, he exhibited the greatest rapacity, and was extremely 

 querulous or noisy when under the influence of hunger. 



57.— Pernis ptilorhynchus, Temm. (23.) 



I procured two examples of this bird in the Fort here 

 durino- last November, and a third was got about the same time 

 by a "gentleman in the Western Province. One of my birds 

 was frequenting the trees in front of the officers' quarters when 

 it was shot, and the other was flying about with some Kites 

 near the barracks. The Honey Buzzard is evidently a straggler 

 to Ceylon in the cooler season, and it has not fallen to the lot of 

 many to observe it, hence the reason of its being overlooked as 

 a Ceylon bird until Mr. Holdsworth published it as such in his 

 catalogue. My specimens appear to be both immature, but they 

 differ very considerably : that which is doubtless the younger 

 of the two has the forehead, sides of the vertex above the eye, 

 and cheeks white with dark shafts ; the lores are blackish grey ; 

 the vertex occiput and crest tawny brown with darker centres 

 and black shafts, the feathers being white at their bases ; the two 

 longest crest feathers are much the darkest having the central 

 patch almost black ; they are tipped broadly with white, the dark 

 shaft continuino- to the apex, the hind neck is whitish washed 

 with pale tawny, and looks as if it had faded from a darker hue ; 

 the entire under surface and under wing-coverts are pure white, 

 with about half a dozen of the throat feathers dark shafted, as also 

 three' or four of the elongated lower flank plumes ; the tail has 

 four black bands (including the apical one) the interspaces 

 beino- filled in with alternate smoky bands and wavy whitish 



cross rays. . . 



The head of the second specimen is in general appearance 

 blackish brown, the white forehead and broad supercilium being 

 absent the feathers are edged yellow brown, and the crest feathers, 

 which are not so long, almost wholly black and untipped with 

 white ; the lores and cheeks immediately below the eye are blackish 

 grey the ear-coverts are concolorous with the head, and the hind 

 neck' deep brown broadly edged with yellow brown. This part 



