248 ON THE FLIGHT OF BIRDS. 
or March. I have had its breeding places indicated to me by 
Burmans, but I have not been able to visit them. 
The white Pelicans are too difficult a group of birds to be 
dealt with here in Burma. I have studied them carefully 
for years, and I hope to be able to throw some light on them 
when working up my series of these birds in England.* 
451.—Phalacrocorax carbo, Zin. (1005.) 
Extremely abundant in all the streams and fisheries of 
Lower Pegu, and somewhat rare in the high northern parts of 
the province. 
452.—Phalacrocorax fuscicollis, Steph. (1006.) 
In some parts of Pegu this Cormorant_is very common. 
Such is the case in the Canal and the Sittang river about 
Myitkyo. Elsewhere it does not appear to be common, occur- 
ring in pairs only, or in very small flocks. 
453.—Phalacrocorax pygmaeus, Pail. (1007.) 
Generally distributed, and very common both in large and 
small streams. 
454.—Plotus melanogaster, Penn. (1008.) 
As the preceding, but perhaps not quite so numerous. 
On the Hlight of Birds. 
a 
TuereE is a high hill behind my house, rising to an elevation 
of above 8,000 feet, which I often ascend in the early morn- 
ings. A little below the summit is a broken precipitous slope, 
nearly a quarter of a mile in length, close along the base of 
which, in the early mornings, Lammergeyers and Vultures (the 
jJatter almost exclusively Gyps himalayensis, nobis), are wont 
* I too have been studying these Pelicans for years, and have several hundred 
specimens collected from all parts of the British Asian Empire. Unable to procure 
specimens of onocrotalus from Europe, I cannot decide what bird it is; but I am 
certain that the three specimens, still in the Asiatic Society’s Museum, on which 
Jerdon founded his three supposed species, onocrotalus, Lin, mitratus, Licht., and 
javanicus, Horsf., one and all belong to the same species. I pointed this out 
nine years ago, vide S. F., I, 128. Of course there 7s a small Pelican in Lower 
Bengal, and that is what Jerdon had seen and referred to under P. javanicus, 
but there is no specimen of this in the Asiatic Society’s Museum, nor, though 
T have twice seen it, have I ever procured a specimen, and the bird he did 
describe (L have verified the measurements), and which is in the Asiatic Society’s 
Museum, is not of this small species, but of the same species as those he described 
under onocrotalus and mitratus. If Mr. Oates will only set us right by careful 
comparison as to what the Burmese javanicus. of which I have some 70 specimens 
of different sexes and ages really is, it will be a great boon to Indian ornitholo- 
gists—Ep , 8, F 
