SUB-GENUS LILLIA, (BOIE, 1859.) 257 



longest and for the most part with an oblong white spot on the 

 inner web ; the feet somewhat larger than in other species of 

 the genus, dusky ; the toes not versatile. Weight 5 to 7 

 drachms, rarely more. The body, 4 - 2 ; the tail, 4*25 ; the mid- 

 dle tail-feathers, 1*93; expanse, 137 ; wing 4-93 ; bill, 0'6j 

 width of gape, 0-64; tibia?, 0-55/' 



It has been the custom (in which I have duly followed my 

 betters) to identify our Himalayan bird with this species ; but 

 in the first place to judge from some 50 specimens, our bird 

 never has any white on the tail-feathers ; in the second place 

 the ferruginous of the rump can hardly be said to extend almost 

 to the middle of the back ; in the third place the upper tail- 

 coverts cannot be said to be steely black, as only quite the 

 longest in our bird are black, the rest are uuicolorous or nearly 

 so with the rump. This might be passed over as carelessness 

 iu description were it not that, in dealing with the lower tail- 

 coverts, Pallas carefully points out that only the tips are black, 

 whereas, as a fact in our bird, the lower tail-coverts are black 

 for from 0'7 to 0"9, while the visible black portion of the upper 

 ones is only about 0'4, very rarely 05 ; so that if Pallas had 

 called either black, it would have been the lower and not the 

 upper, and when he is careful to mention in regard to the lower, 

 so much of which is black, that it is only the terminal portions 

 that are so, a fortiori, one would think, he would not have 

 called the upper tail-coverts black, without reservation, when 

 so little of them is of this color. 



As to size,* I do not exactly understand how Pallas 

 measured his body and tail separately ; the two dimensions, 

 however, added give a total length of 8'45, against a maximum 

 length in the flesh, for our birds, of 7*9 — the great majority 

 of fully-plumaged adults not exceeding 7 75, and only one, 

 out of some 30, (measured in the flesh) exceeding 7'8. But in 

 regard to the wings there is not so much difference, as they run 

 in our Himalayan and Tenasserim Hill birds from f'G to f m 8. 



Again, the tail is never shining black, but always hair brown, 

 with, in the freshly moulted bird, a certain lustre, bluish to- 

 wards the base and greenish towards the tips of the feathers. 



Lastly, it cannot be said of our Himalayan specimens that the 

 red occipital patches often meet on the nape, because in fully- 

 plumaged adults there is invariably a distinct rufous collar, not 

 broad, as Mr. Swinhoe says (P. Z. S., 1871, p. 846) butdistiucfc 

 and about 0*2, or iu some cases possibly 025 wide. I speak 

 of course of the fresh bird ; in nine out of ten skins the collar 

 almost wholly disappears. 



* Nauinaun gives (XIII., 211) the following dimensions of a specimen from the 

 Altai Mountains : — Length 8 8 ; tail, 52 ; wing, 575. 



