XXXI 7 



Juv. Head pale brown, not ashy. 

 Hab. Cape York, N.E. Australia. 



This form is verv closely allied to and possibly only a 

 subspecies of P. griseiceps. 



Mr. E. Hartert also made some remarks on the Crested 

 Larks [Galeridcs) , and observed that there were some of his 

 friends who had expressed to him their disbelief in the many 

 sub-species of Galerida cristata recognized in an article in 

 ' Novitates Zoologic^e ' about two years ago ; but he could 

 assure the sceptics that there were many more forms yet to 

 be discriminated, and that he would shortly describe some 

 more races, examples of which he had recently received. The 

 explanation of the great local variation of G. cristata lay 

 entirely in their having absolutely limited areas of distri- 

 bution. It was possible that one or two of the forms 

 recognized in the above-mentioned article would not stand as 

 good sub-species, but the majority were very distinct, and 

 many more might yet be discovered. There was, however, 

 one mistake in his memoir which he admitted. He had 

 enumerated Galerida thekia as one of the sub-species of 

 G. cristata, but he found now that the secondaries, in the 

 adult bird, were so much shorter than in G. cristata, and 

 the first (spurious) primary was comparatively so much 

 longer, that it would be necessary to follow Dr. Sharpe in 

 recognizing G. thekla as a distinct species, especially since 

 recent observations had shown that forms of G. cristata 

 and G. theklfe breed in the same area, while Mr. Hartert 

 formerly supposed that they inhabited different pares of the 

 country. The specific dift'ereuce of G. theklce had been 

 insisted on by Brehm and Sharpe, and recently again [in 

 Utteris) by Kleinschmidt, but nobody had ever pointed out 

 the most important characters. There were other features 

 besides, in the form and size of bill and in the colour. 

 Galerida malabarica would also have to stand as a species, 

 being after all very different from G. cristata. Mr. Hartert 

 hoped to return to the interesting subject of the Crested 

 Larks on a future occasion. He considered that his invcs- 

 tijjations had, in fact, only ju>t roinmcuced. 



