HIEUNDO RUSTICA. 589 



so, with the rufous-marked band ; and it is this fact which prevents my considering gutturalis a good species ; at 

 the same time it cannot be denied that birds from certain districts do run sinall. Whether these are all bred in 

 the same locality it would not be possible to say. The results of my examination of a series of skins are as 

 follows : — I find some Siberian skins, and one from Amoy, with the band quite as black as some from England ; 

 and, as regards size, a Hampshire specimen, one from Siberia, and one from as far east as Formosa measure 4-85, 

 4-8, and 4-75 respectively, and all have the same black pectoral band. Several examples from Central Asia 

 (Kardatchino, Sargaschino, &c.) are very large (wing 5-0), and have the black band much interrupted by the rufous 

 colour of the throat. These latter have longer tails than any others which I have seen, the outer feathers in one 

 example being 3-5 inches longer than the centre pair. Finally, Mr. Hume finds that in Sindh and Western India 

 the Swallows are of the true rustica type, with a wing of 4-8 to 5-0 (many English specimens do not reach 4-8) and 

 the tail 4-7 to 5-0. The inference, therefore, to be drawn from these data is that in Asia the Common Swallow 

 varies in size and colouring in different districts of the continent, and that its several races either intermix or 

 contain here and there birds typical of each other in such a manner that the Asiatic form cannot be considered 

 a good species. 



In Palestine and India there is a resident and closely allied species to the common Swallow, viz. Eirundo savignii, 

 Stephens. This bird (which is the H. cahirica, Licht., of Canon Tristram, and H. riocourii, Audouin, of Shelley, 

 ' Birds of Egypt ') differs from the present species in having the under surface from the baud downwards chestnut- 

 red instead of whitish or buff as in the latter ; the spots on the tail are rusty white instead of pure white. 

 Canon Tristram remarks that this colour is constant, " neither fading nor intensifying " at any time of the year. 

 "Specimens shot at all seasons are precisely similar" (' Ibis,' 1S67, p. 361). This bird is reported to visit 

 Europe and to breed with H. rustica ; but Mr. Dresser is of opinion that brightly coloured examples of the latter 

 species in spring plumage have been mistaken for it. Canon Tristram, in the same article, says that the two never 

 interbreed in Palestine. 



Hirundo tyileri (Jerdon, App. vol. iii. B. of India, p. 870) is an Indian member of this group of Swallows. It appears 

 to be scarcely distinguishable, as regards its plumage, from H. savignii. The original description is, " Glossy 

 black above, beneath dark ferruginous chestnut ; form and size of H. rustica" It was discovered at Dacca, and 

 appears to migrate to Pegu and Tenasserim, affecting the first-named province from July till May. 



From Messrs. Sharpe and Dresser's researches (P. Z. S. 1870, and ' Birds of Europe') it would appear that the European 

 Swallows undergo, as immature birds, the same changes which I have described above ; they state that the sienna 

 frontlet entirely disappears when the bird is in its winter plumage in South Africa, and that there is a mere 

 indication of it by the presence of a few pale buff-coloured feathers. This is just as it is in Ceylon with 

 our birds. 



Distribution. — The Swallow arrives usually in the north of the island about the second or third week in 

 September, the young birds corning in first. The period of its arrival is, however, somewhat irregular, and 

 perhaps depends upon the break up of the south-west monsoon to some extent. Its numbers are increased 

 considerably in about a fortnight after its first appearance, and it then begins to spread southward, but does 

 not do so always as regularly as might be expected. Mr. Parker has observed it at Puttalarn as early as the 

 20th September one year, when my earliest date noted down at Colombo was not till after the 1st of October. 

 At other times I have seen it at Colombo in the middle of September, and I observed it at Galle in 1872 

 on the 15th of that month. It inhabits the whole of the low country, and likewise ascends into the hill- 

 districts to a considerable elevation, but does not inhabit the higher regions in any abundance. It leaves the 

 island completely about the second week in April, quitting the southern districts a week or two prior to that 

 date. It is, I think, commoner on the west coast than on the east. 



About the first week in August, according to Captain Butler, the Swallow arrives in the Mount- Aboo 

 district, and leaves again as early as February ; it soon spreads throughout India, but does not seem to visit 

 all districts at the same time, for Captain Beavan writes that they visit Maunbhoom in January and leave 

 quite by the end of February. In the Andamans, according to Messrs. Hume and Davison, they do not 

 disappear until May, from which I gather that the birds inhabiting those islands (although Mr. Hume, when 

 writing of them in 1874, considered them identical with the English bird) must belong to the gutturalis type 

 which visits Tenasserim, and which migrates in a different direction to those which inhabit Western India. 

 Not a few breed along the Himalayas from 4000 to 7000 feet, while still more remain in Cashmere for that 

 purpose, and Captain Hutton found them nesting abundantly at Candahar. On the plains of Eastern 

 Turkestan Dr. Scully says they arrive (from the south I conclude) about the middle of April, breeding there 



