REMARKS ON THE GJENUS IORA. 423 



in practice susceptible of any such definition as will permit the 

 separation of half the forms met with, except by the adoption of 

 some purely arbitrary and unnatural standard. 



I shall discuss this question more fully when dealing with 

 the species in question. In the meantime, I will commence with 

 a brief empirical key to the several species of the genus that 

 I recognize : — 

 Wings without any transverse bar. 



Wing, 2-6 to 29; bill from gape, 08 to 1. \ t lafl'esnavii. 



Wings with two* conspicuous transverse bars. 



Tail, black or yellowish olive green, or a mixture. 

 Upper part of head, nape and back, grass 

 green, a conspicuous light yellow eye ring. 



Wing, 2-35 to 2'5 ; bill from gape, 07 to 075 2. vil'idissima 



Upper part of head, nape and back, black or yellow- 

 ish olive green, or a mixture, within one race 

 some pure yellow on upper back ; no conspicuous 

 eye-ring 3, tiphia. 



Tail always black and white or greyish white, in 



varying proportions 4 # ni'crrolutea. 



1.— Iora Lafresnayii, Ilartl. Revue Zoologique, 

 1844, 401. 



Mag. de Zool., 1845.— Stoliczha. J. A. S. B., XXXIX., 309, 



1870. 



innotata, BlytK (? ? ) J. A. S. B., XVI., 472,1847. 



Phosnicomanes iora, Sharpe, P. Z. S., 1874, 427, pi. 54; A. 

 & M. N. H., 1875, 236. 



Although referred to a few mouths previously by Mr. 

 Strickland (A. and M. N. H., 1844, 42,) as a new Iora lately 

 obtained by Dr. Horsfield, equal iu size to the small Oriolus 

 aanthonotus {!), the Great Iora was first described by Hart- 

 laub (op. et he. cit.) as follows : — 



u Above olivaceous green, with blackish points to the feathers ; 

 forehead and rump, yellowish ; wings and tail, uniform steely 

 black ; under wing-coverts and the internal margins of the 

 quills on their basal halves, white ; lores, the little feathers 

 round the eyes, and the entire lower surface, including chin 

 and lower tail-coverts, very bright yellow ; bill, plumbeous, 

 with albescent margins ; the feet, apparently plumbeous. 

 Length, 63; bill from gape 0*96 ; at front, ; 73— Malacca." 



Blyth was the next to notice the species (op. et loc. cit.) 

 u The specimen before me, obtained in Arrakanby Captain Phayre, 

 was probably a female, measuring 6 inches iu length, the wino- 



* Some individuals of the Southern race of tiphia, males in full breeding plumage 

 and only about one in three or four of these, with the wbole top of head and back black 

 entirely lose the lower wing bar, the white tippings to the greater coverta, apparently, 

 wearing off. 



