146 NIXOX SCUTULATA. 



their concealed portions with white, the terminal bands generally showing ; edge of the wing white ; least wing- 

 coverts darker brown than the rest ; primaries, their coverts, and the secondaries rich deep brown, the margins of 

 the longer primaries fulvous, and the inner webs of all the quills crossed with narrow bars, which, near the tip, 

 are faintly lighter than the ground-colour, and near the base fulvescent buff ; tail drab-brown, crossed with five 

 deep brown bars and tipped pale, the basal bar being concealed beneath the coverts. 



Edge of the forehead and base of the loral plumes white, shafts and tips of the loral and chin-plumes black ; upper 

 throat whitish, the feathers with dark shafts ; sides of the face and ear-coverts concolorous with the head ; chest, 

 breast, and flanks rich chocolate- brown ; the chest and upper breast-feathers margined laterally with fulvous- 

 yellow ; the centre of the breast, belly, flanks, and the lengthened tibial coverts crossed with a broad bar of white 

 on the centre of each feather, and a patch of the same at the base ; on the lower flanks some of the bars are 

 usually interrupted at the centre ; vent and uuder tail-coverts white, the latter sometimes barred or streaked 

 slightly with dark brown ; legs rufous-brown ; the thighs spotted with buff ; bases of the tarsal feathers whitish ; 

 bristles of the feet brown ; lesser uuder wing-coverts chocolate-brown, spotted and margined with fulvous ; primary 

 under-coverts dark brown, scantily barred with buff. 



Examples (even those which are adult) from Ceylon vary to a certain extent in the depth of the upper-surface colour, 

 some being much darker on the back than others. The hue of the tail varies considerably, the oldest birds probably 

 having the ground-colour less smoky or more cinereous than others. The yellow edgings of the chest-feathers 

 extend down the sides of the breast in some examples, and the edges of the white bars on the under surface are 

 conspicuously tinged with ochraceous yellow. The specimen mentioned below, from Maskeliya, and another I 

 have seen from the Central Province are very dark above, and have the primary-coverts almost blackish brown ; 

 they are likewise very large birds. 



Young *. A nestling, taken from the nest by Mr. Mac Vicar, is described to me as very like the old bird in general aspect, 

 clothed with fluffy brown feathers above, and having brown-centred white-margined feathers on the lower parts. 

 At two months its plumage greatly resembled that of an adult. There are, however, slight differences which will 

 be noticed in the following description of a yearling bird in my collection : — Upper surface lighter brown than the 

 adult, with the lower head and hind neck contrasting more with the colour of the back ; upper tail-coverts with 

 pale tips ; greater wing-coverts paling into rufous-brown at the edges, which are very finely margined pale ; 

 longer primaries with white indentations at the outer edges : secondaries edged near the tips with whitish ; tail 

 light drab, deeply tipped with greyish, and barred with five bands of a lighter brown than in the adult ; beneath 

 the coverts there is a sixth baud. 



Cheeks paler than the crown ; chin white ; chest and breast pale chocolate-brown, the former margined with whitish, 

 and the latter barred very broadly with white ; the feathers of the lower breast and belly tipped with white ; 

 lengthened tibial plumes, vent, and under tail-coverts unmarked white, the latter of which are in tkeJJujft/ stage. 



Obs. The Ceylouese Hawk-Owl was considered by Temminck, who described it in 1824 from the island, as distinct 

 from the Strix scutulata of Raffles, from Sumatra. The specific name of hirsuta has accordingly been applied 

 by most writers to the Ceylon species, as the type of N. scutulata was not forthcoming for purposes of comparison 

 and discrimination. Mr. Sharpe, in his catalogue of the Owls, has given an exhaustive series of comparative 

 descriptions of the Hawk-Owl from the Indian Peninsula, Ceylon, Malacca, Labuan, various parts of China, Japan, 

 and Formosa, and considers them to be identical. The race from Sumatra was not then represented in the 

 collections he examined, and this important link was wanting to complete the chain of evidence as to the widely- 

 spread species being the S. scutulata of Baffles. Lord Tweeddale has, however, since received an example from 

 Sumatra which may fairly be considered to represent Eaffles's bird. It is said to correspond well with Malaccan 

 birds, as Mr. Sharpe suggested would one day be found to be the case ; and the latter I find are not separable from 

 our Ceylouese race. In size they compare well with our birds, the wings of four which I have examined varying 

 from 7 - 7 to 7"9 ; another individual from Rangoon, and two from Labuan, the latter slightly smaller (7 - 4 in the wing), 

 are likewise not to be separated as regards plumage from Ceylon birds. The hue of the upper surface, the dark 

 cinereous tinge of the head, and the barring of the flanks and sides of the abdomen are the same in all. Whatever 

 the birds from Northern India, Cachar, China, and Japan may be (and it is not my province, in a local work such 

 as this, to go into the vexed question of this species), those from Southern India, Ceylon, Sumatra, the Nicobars, 



6 I find that I was in error, at page 280, ' Ibis,' 1875, in my description of the immature plumage ; further investi- 

 gation and experience have tended to show that the iris is variable in the adult, of which the bright fulvous edgings to 

 the throat-feathers is also a frequent character. 



