622 ' MR. o. THOMAS ON THE [May 3, 



that, the types being in England and the workers on the subject in 

 India, an attennpt had to be made to determine the species from the 

 pubhshed descriptions, an almost hopeless tasi<. It must, however, 

 be said that other authors have not given in all cases the most per- 

 fect descriptions, many of those of Mr. Blyth himself being especially 

 short and unsatisfactory. In all, there have been no less than ninety 

 Indian species described, belonging, in my opinion, to only nineteen 

 valid species, thus giving an average of more than four synonyms to 

 every species. 



In writing the present paper I have had the advantage of access 

 to the following materials, which, including as they do the types of the 

 greater part of the described species, may be looked upon as quite 

 unequalled. 



1. Full series of all the species collected and described by Mr. 

 Hodgson in Nepal, some presented by him direct to the British 

 IMuseum, others obtained through the India Museum, South 

 Kensington. 



2. The types of the Indian species described by the late Dr. J. E. 

 Gray. 



3. A most valuable collection of specimens in spirit from all parts 

 of India, numbering about 130 individuals. This was presented by 

 Mr. "W. T. Blanford, and collected partly by the donor himself and 

 partly by Mr. Mandelli (Darjiling), Col. St. John (Ajmere), the 

 Rev. S. Fairbank (Ahmednagar), Col. R. H. Beddome (South India), 

 and others. 



4. A considerable series of skins lent to me for examination by 

 Mr. Blanford, and similarly collected in all parts of India. 



5. The specimens collected by Sir Walter Elliot in the Southern 

 IMahratta country and other parts of South India, including the 

 types of the species described by him. 



6. Collections of greater or less extent made by Dr. J. Scully 

 (Gilgit), Captain Hutton (Mussooree), Capt. Pemberton (Bbotan), 

 Dr. Kelaart (Ceylon), Mr. H. Cuming (Ceylon), etc. 



7. The collection of drawings of Nepalese species formed by Mr. 

 Hodgson, and lent to me by this Society, with manuscript notes 

 appended to nearly all of them. These notes are hereafter frequently 

 referred to. 



8. A collection of about 50 spirit specimens from various parts of 

 India; presented to the British Museum by the Trustees of the 

 Calcutta Museum^ 



Altogether I have examined about 450 Indian specimens. It will 

 be seen by the asterisks prefixed to the names in the synonymy that, 

 of the nineteen good species allowed here, we have the types of no 

 less than thirteen, besides the types of all the four subspecies or 



1 Tbis collection, kindly sent by Dr. Anderson, only arrived while the present 

 paper was in the press ; but it has nevertheless been of considerable service to 

 me in confirming my results, the specimens being all named by Dr. Anderson, 

 and being therefore very useful in helping the ideutification of those species of 

 which tlie types are at Calcuttii. The letter accompanjing this collecliou is 

 quoted in footnotes in several places below. 



