461 



Covte matrorbpcjjtt0, of Wagler. 



My friend, Mr. Sharpe, in his admirable Catalogue, Vol. III., 

 separates the Large-billed Crows of India, Burmah and the Malay 

 Peninsula into two species and one sub-species. The one spe- 

 cies he designates culmenatus, with which he concurs with me 

 in uniting intermedins. The second species he takes as macror- 

 hynchus, Wagler, with levaillanti, Less., as a sub-species. 



The first he places in the genus Corvus ; the two second in 

 the genus Corone. 



Now, the primary distinction between Mr. Sharpe's genus 

 Corvus and his genus Corone are these — 



Corvus. — First primary long, equal to, or exceeding the, inner- 

 most secondaries in length. 



Corone. — First primary longer than the ordinary secondaries, 

 but not as long as the innermost of the latter. 



These, then, are the primary differences by which we are to 

 diagnose Corvus culmenatus on the one hand, and Corone macror- 

 hyncha and levaillanti on the other, and these two latter are to be 

 distinguished, inter se, by macrorhyncha having pure white bases 

 to the feathers which levaillanti has not. 



Besides this, while admitting that levaillanti and macrorhyncha 

 are undistinguishable by dimensions (though the bill in the latter 

 is supposed to average larger) he clearly considers that cul- 

 menatus is much smaller, and he gives us a number of careful 

 measurements, which serve to illustrate his view, a resume 

 of which I reproduce, omitting only the length, to which, as 

 taken from skins, I attach no value. 



Dimensions according to Mr. Sharpe. 



No. of Dimension's. 



Speci- 

 Species. mens Localities. 



me g l d sur " Culmen. Wing. Tail. Tarsus. 



f Deccan, Madras, Hima- - ) 

 C. culmenatus... 5 •< layas ... V 2-15-2-6 110-11-82 6' 5-75 21-2'2 



(.Rehar, Nepal ...J 



/-Bali, Malacca, Penang...") 

 r> ti. ii j East Java, Sumatra ... f «.<■ o.n igin.it ».o n.e 



C. macrorhyncha 11 j F i oregj East Timor ... f 2 6-3-0 12 1-14 45 7"2-9 5 



(.Samoa Timor ) 



f India, North India, ...^ 

 I .Afghanistan, Kuloo, I 

 I Nynee Tal ... | 



C levaillanti ... 27 ^ Nepal, Andamans, Bha- ',, 2 -2-2-85 11-5-1435 73-93 2-05-2-5 

 i mo ... , 



j Taping, Tsit-kan, Ponsee I 

 I Yunan, China, Fokien .. | 

 L Hainan, Dssuri K. ...J 



I have always hitherto considered that these three supposed 

 species were founded upon larger and smaller examples of one and 



21-245 



