350 NOTES. 



The entire lower parts, including wing lining, lower tail- 

 coverts, &c, pale greyish isabelline. 



Bill, blackish horny ; legs and feet, yellowish fleshy ; claws, 

 pale horny brown. 



I hope next year, with Dr. Duke's kind assistance, to be 

 able to submit a tolerably complete list of the birds of the 

 dominions of His Highness the Khan of Khelat. 



At present including all the species that Mr. Blanford, 

 Captain Butler and myself obtained on the Mekran Coast and 

 along the Western frontier of Beloochistan, and those obtained 

 in the low lands Cthe Kutchee) and the high lands of Khelat, 

 Quetta, &c, by Major Sandeman, Dr. Duke, &c, I can only 

 number 170 species. 



Of these the only ones requiring early notice are : — 

 (1). Hypocolius ampelinus, which I have already just 

 noticed. 



(2). Sitta neumayeri. — These are typical and identical with 

 specimens from Macedon, aud are not the smaller Persian form, 

 described by Blanford, Ibis, 1873, p. 87, under the name of 

 rupicola. See, also, Blanf. Zoo. Pers., 225, pi. XV. f. 2). 



(2>). Carine bactriana, Hutton. The Highlands of Khelat 

 are a continuation and zoologically form a part of those of 

 Afghanistan. The small owl of Quetta, &c, is therefore, un- 

 questionably, bactriana of Hutton. This owl has the feet fully 

 feathered — it is apparently, therefore, identical with plumipes of 

 Swinhoe, P. Z. S., 1870, 448, and will supersede that and all 

 other names for that species. — (See also Sharpe, Cat. II., 137). 



Since my paper on the Indian Gisticolce, {ante p. 90), in 

 which I suggested the identity of homalura, melanocephala and 

 Tytleri, was in type, I have received two more of melanocephala 

 and six of Tytleri, all killed in the same grass patch near 

 Suddya in Assam, on the same and two or three successive 

 days. 



I remark first that two of the specimens of Tytleri and one 

 of melanocephalus have the tails precisely as described by Blyth 

 in the case of homalura. 



Blyth, however, says that the bill in homalura is stouter than 

 in cursitans. Well, the bills vary in both species, and you may 

 easily pick out a melanocephalus, with a bill stouter than that 

 of some cursitans, but taking five or six of each species I can- 

 not see that the bills differ at all. 



With this sole exception, melanocephala, or rather some 

 melanocephalas, agree absolutely with Blyth's description of 



