NOTES. 499 



Major Godwin-Austen, Pr. A. S B., June 1877, describes 

 a supposed new Chlensicus under the title of C. rnjiceps, var 

 Atro superciliaris, in the following terms : — 



" No mention being made of any black eyebrow in the ori- 

 ginal discription of C. rnjiceps, and finding it absent in the 

 type in the Indian Museum, I now describe the variety from 

 Sudiya, Upper Assam/' 



" Description. — Bright ferruginous ; on the head same colour, 

 paler on the nape and ear-coverts ; back and wings pale olive- 

 brown ; quills tinged rufous ; tail brown, a narrow black streak 

 over the eye ; beneath dull white with an earthy tinge ; legs 

 dark plumbeous." 



" Length about 6 ; wing, 2"85 ; tail, 33 ; tarsus, 090 ; bill at 

 front, 043 inches/' 



" Larger than Ch. ruficeps and not so white below/' 



I do not consider this a valid variety. The bird is so rare 

 that even my museum contains only a single specimen, but that 

 a very fine one from Sikhim. This shows a distinct blackish 

 dusky (not quite black), supercilium beginning a little in front 

 of the middle of the eye and extending backwards over the 

 ear-coverts. My bird measures in the skin : — Length, 6*0 ; wing, 

 2 - 83 ; tail, 3*15 ; tarsus, 092 ; bill, straight from frontal bone 

 to tip, 0'52. This is, I believe, a male; the type was probably 

 a female. 



Jerdon only described the female Brachypterys fiyperythra 

 (B. of I., 495) ; he does not seem even to have seen or procured 

 the male. This latter has been repeatedly procured by Mr. 

 Mandelli, who sent me, from time to time, some splendid speci- 

 mens of it along with the females. 



I do not know whether -any one else has, subsequent to the 

 publication of the Birds of India, described the male, but 

 the latter seems to be so little known that a brief description 

 of it will not be useless. 



^. Length, 5 ; wing, 2*5 ; tail, 20; bill from forehead to 

 point, 06 ; tarsus, 1*13. 



The entire upper surface of the bird, including the face, sides 

 of the head, sides of the neck, and sides of the body under the 

 ■wings, blackish cyaneous ; the lores aud feathers at the base 

 of the lower mandible, and the eyelid feathers immediately 

 above and below the eye, and sometimes more or less of the ear- 

 coverts, black ; chin, throat, breast, abdomen, lower tail-coverts 

 intense orange ferruginous, a little paler on the chin and throat, 

 and again often decidedly paler in the middle of the abdomen, 

 in some specimens becoming almost creamy. There is a short, 



