426 REMARKS ON THE GENUS IORA. 



Malacca is undoubtedly that of the adult male in spring and 

 summer. 



It is not impossible that all our birds from Tenasserim are 

 immature ; the females not differing materially from what 

 they would be when adult, and the males only differing from 

 the females in the brighter aud more golden yellow of the lower 

 parts. 



It is, however, quite possible that the Tenasserim and Arakan 

 birds may represent a distinct race, differing from Lafresnayi, 

 just as tiplda does from zeylonica — the males not assuming 

 the black plumage of the breeding season, and moreover retain- 

 ing, as a rule, the olive-green tails of the female. 



This seems hardly likely, but then neither is it likely that 

 more than 30 specimens, secured from April to November, all 

 of which, so far as the look of the feathers go, seem adult, 

 should all be immature. No doubt, one May specimen exhibits 

 traces of assuming the black plumage, and is certainly getting 

 the black wings and tail, but then even in the strongholds of 

 typical tiplda, individual birds closely approximating to the 

 typical zeylonica plumage, may be met with. 



The following is a description of our Tenasserim specimens, 

 whether immature or representatives of a distinct race time must 

 show : — 



Male. — The iclwle upper surface, including the wing-coverts 

 and almost the whole visible portion of the tertiaries, is a dull, 

 slightly, yellowish olive green, obscurely pencilled, and the fea- 

 thers here and there feebly fringed with dusky, yellower on 

 the head and tail, and passing to a greenish golden yellow on 

 the forehead ; most of the lateral tail-feathers, except 

 the central and outer pairs, with a broad stripe of brown- 

 ish black on the inner webs next the shafts ; tertiaries, blackish 

 brown, very much overlaid with olive green, the blackish brown 

 only showing as a band along the basal two-thirds of the 

 shaft, though spreading more or less on either side towards 

 the margins in the shape of rudimentary bars ; primaries and 

 secondaries, deep brown ; all but the first or first two in some, 

 narrowly margined with olive-green, greenish-white or dull- 

 white, the shade varying much in different specimens, but 

 the margins of the earlier primaries being always whitest, and 

 those of the later secondaries (some of which are, however, 

 often narrowly tipped whitish), greenest. 



The lores, ring round eye, cheeks, chin, throat, sides of neck, 

 breast, abdomen, vent and lower tail-coverts, intense gamboge 

 yellow ; ear-coverts, the same, slightly shaded with olive green ; 

 sides of breast, olive green; a huge patch on the flanks of 

 very long, silky fluffy feathers, mingled grey and white ; 



