THE BIRDS OF MESOPOTAMIA. 383 
porting melon plants. The nests aie small cups, made of fine grass and small 
twigs, lined with finer grass and date palm fibre with a little ‘‘ cottony ” material. 
21 specimens examined: ¢ @, Hilla, 16-3-19; 9, Khazimain, 15-2-19, 
Q, 13-11-18; 3, Basra, 19-4-17 (P. Z. C. and R. E. C.); Y, Shustar, 20-1-18; 
(F. M. B.); ¢, Amara, 28-3-18 (P. A. R.); 4 Nahr Umar, 25-3-18(C. R. P.) 
& Basra, 20-11-17 type; 40, 39, 17-19--3-18 (C. B. T.). 
Jos leucotis of Gould was described from “In India orientali” (P. Z. S., 1836, 
p. 6,); here there is nothing to shew whence Gould obtained his specimens 
but it is known that his son collected in Sind and sent his father specimens ; 
I therefore designate Karachi in Sind as the restricted type locality for the 
typical race. 
In the Bombay Journal (loc. cit.) I described the Bulbul of Mesopotamia as 
a new race of the Indian bird, characterized by its rather longer wing and tail 
and larger bill, the yellow rim round the eyelids and rather darker underparts. I 
described it from a series obtained in Basra and these birds had markedly dark 
underparts. I have since seen more of these Bulbuls from elsewhere in Meso- 
potamia and I am not sure that this last character holds so markedly as I at 
first thought. I find all birds from Basra are darker than from elsewhere 
in Mesopotamia, and I think it is due to grime from the many steamers which 
anchored there during the war. I particularly noticed it to be the case with the 
Prinia and Francolinus. 
The other characters however hold good, viz., yellow eye rim, longer wing 
and tail, and larger bill. Hartert (Vog. P. Fauna, p. 462) gives measurements 
of leucotis as wing 91-94, tail 86-92 mm. A number of Sind males however mea- 
sure: wing 83-88, tail 80-89 m.m. ; 
Pitman records that on May 25th near Feluja, where this Bulbul does not occur. 
he saw a pair of Bulbuls which had no white on the cheeks and whose general 
colour was dull smokey brown. Possibly P. capensis «anthopygos occurs 
here and in some other parts, but the question requires further investigation 
before this, the Palestine Bulbul, can be admitted to the fauna. 
68. Spotted Flycatcher. Muscicapa grisola. 
(1) Muscicapa grisola grisola, L. (Syst. Nat. Ed. 12, 1, p. 328, 1766— 
Europe). 
(2) Muscicapa grisola neumannt, Poche (Orn. Monats., 1904, Pp: 26; 
N. W. Massailand). 
The Spotted Flycatcher is a passage migrant in fair numbers, arriving rather 
late in spring ; the first may be looked for about the middle of April and they are 
numerous later in the month; some are found throughout May, and Buxton 
noted them at Amara until the second week in June, but there was no indication 
of their breeding there. The return passage begins about September 10th and 
they are common all the month. Buxton found them still common at Amara 
on October 25th, but they soon after disappeared. During their passages 
they are widely distributed throughout the region. 
Weigold, who found the species common on spring passage at Urfa (April 
15th—-30th) is inclined to think his specimens belong to the Eastern form 
neumannt. 
(1) Twelve skins examined: 3, Amara, 27-5-18 (two); ¢ Q, 9-9-18, 3 4:10-17 
(P. A. B.) ; Tekrit, 17-4-19; S. Saad, 16-91-7; Shaiba, 23-9-16 (P. Z.C. and R. E. 
C.); Basra, 1918 (Hobkirk). 
All these are the paler newmanni, which probably, is the commoner of the 
two races. It nests in small numbers as near as the Zagros (Zarudny). 
(2) 2, Feluja, 8-5-17 (C. R. P.); Basra, 5-5-17 (L. Home). 
These belong to the typical European race. It is interesting to note that 
these were all got about the same day and perhaps represented a wave of 
migration of this race. 
