REMARKS ON THE GENUS PERICROCOTUS. 197 



the smaller ardens, or perhaps xanthog aster if no distinct 

 species turns up in Sumatra. 



14.— Pericrocotus flammeus, Forst. 



Penn. Zool. Ind., 25 to 15. Gould. B. of As., Pt. II., PL 4, 

 Jerd. B. of I., I., 420, No. 272. 111. Ind. Orn., PI. II. 



In this species neither sex has any coloured patch (I have ex- 

 amined 52 specimens) on either of the first four primaries, but 

 out of 36 males two have a hair line of red on the fourth primary. 

 Mr. Sharpe, (S. F., IV., p. 207,) seemed of opinion that this was 

 not a constant character, but I have found* it so in 52 speci- 

 mens, and I must maintain that either the wing's he examined 

 were imperfect, or that the birds were not really flammeus from 

 Southern India and Ceylon, where alone the species occurs. As 

 far as mere colour goes, I too, like Blyth, have and have seen 

 specimens of elegans, not distinguishable from others of flam- 

 meus,^ though taking a lot of each species, from known localities, 

 there cau be no doubt that the tint of flammeus male is more 

 fiery than that of either speciosus, elegans, or andamanensis, 

 from all of which the number of plain primaries in the male 

 at once distinguishes it, as also from flammifer which approaches 

 it nearest in tint. 



The females cannot thus be distinguished from those of the 

 two last-named species, but they differ in the less extent of 

 the orange or yellow on the forehead, in the darker grey of 

 the back, and in the clearer and purer yellow of the lower 

 surface. 



Wings of this species that I measured are as follows : — 



t's— 3-6; 3 62; 37; 3'6 ; 372; 37; 3-6; 3-68; 375; 

 3-73; 3-6; 37; 36. 



?'s— 3'45; 345; 3-6; 35; 365; 37; 3'6 ; 3"47 ; 3'55 ; 

 3-45; 3-6; 3'6. 



I dare say that to many there will appear a great deal of 

 hair splitting in what I have written about the different species, 

 but I have studied the Indiau members of the group now 

 carefully, with by far the largest series of properly-sexed, 



* See also ray remarks on this point, S. F., IV., p. 394. 



t I found 2 specimens of !J> elegans from Hill Tipperah, in my own collection, 

 labelled flammeus by myself. 



The only clear difference in these two birds, except in the 3 plain primaries of fe- 

 male elegans, and the four plain ones of flammeus, consisted in the two misnamed birds 

 having a great deal more orange on the forehead than female flammeus ever has. As 

 a rule the yellow on the rump is more extended and more orange, and the yellow 

 generally, especially on the tail feathers, is more orange in $ elegans than in flammeus, 

 but in the case of these particular two, to say the truth, very indifferent specimens 

 these differences were not appreciable, and thus while a lot of typical males and* 

 females from Hill Tipperah had been correctly labelled elegans, these two (I had not 

 studied the primaries in those days) had gone down as flammeus, which, to a cursory- 

 glance, they more resemble than they do typical elegans. 



b2 



