PHAETHON FLAVIEOSTEIS. 1173 



Iris brown ; bill pale gamboge-yellow ; legs and feet fleshy, tarsus and base of toes yellowish ; tips of toes blackish. 



Plumage glossy white, with the following parts black : — a band across tbe lores continued over the eye and beyond the 

 ear-coverts, a stripe along the median wing-coverts from near the point of the wing to the tertials, the uppermost 

 series of the latter feathers and the terminal portion of the scapulars, a broad stripe down the 1st four primaries 

 from the base to the tip ; also the shafts of the primaries and their coverts, of the secondaries and all the tail- 

 feathers, in each case not quite to the tip. 



Young. At first naked and then covered with long woolly down, dingy white, sullied with grey on the head, back, and 

 pinions. An example before me, kindly lent by Canon Tristram, has the bill yellow, with black tips ; legs yellowish, 

 feet dusky : bill to gape 1-52 inch, tarsus - 6. 



In immature plumage it is to be presumed this species is barred on the hind neck, back, and wings like the other 

 members of the genus ; but I have been unable to detect any such specimens in collections, and Canon Tristram 

 and Mr. Salvin both inform me that they have never met with the bird in this stage. 



Obs. The Eed-tailed Tropic-bird may possibly occur on the coasts of Ceylon. Mr.Holdsworth includes it in his list ; 

 but I incline to the opinion that the birds he saw belong to the species noticed below. P. rubricaucla has the bill 



? PHAETHON LNDICUS. 

 (THE LESSER TROPIC-BIRD.) 



Phaeton cethereus (Linn.), Hume, Str. Feath. 1873, p. 286 ; Heuglin, Orn. N.Ost-Afr. ii. p. 1467 (1873). 



Phaeton rubrieauda (Bodd.), Holdsw. P. Z. S. 1872, p. 482. 



Phaeton indicus, Hume, Str. Feath. 1876, p. 481, et 1879 (List B. of Ind.), p. 116 ; Butler, ibid. 1877, p. 302. 



Males (Gulf of Oman). Length (excluding elongated central tail-feathers) 19-85 to 23-4 inches ; wing 10-75 to 11-8 ; 

 tail 7'5 to 10-3 ; expanse 37-0 to 39-5 ; tarsus 1-0 to 1-13 ; middle toe and claw 1-55 to 1-8 ; bill at front 2-2 

 to 2-45 : weight 1 lb. 1 oz. to 1 lb. 4 oz. — Female. Length 24-0 ; wing 11*7 ; bill at front 2-4 ; tarsus 1-0. {Hume.) 



Iris deep brown ; bill dull orange-red, margins of both mandibles, nostrils, and tip dusky ; legs and hallux and its web 

 and basal joint of other toes white, tinged bluish and creamy yellow. {Hume.) 



Plumage white, barred on the back, scapulars, rump, and upper tail-coverts with black ; a black crescent in front of 

 the eye, and a narrow black line from the gape along the bill to the culmen; a black line from the posterior angle 

 of the eye running round the back of the nape, the feathers above this collar on the nape with a black bar at the 

 tip ; the winglet, the greater coverts of the first five primaries, the shafts and outer webs of these latter feathers, 

 together with a narrow stripe along the shaft on the inner web, black ; tertials and their greater coverts black, 

 narrowly margined on the exterior webs and tipped with white ; shafts of the inner primaries black at the base, 

 likewise those of the tail-feathers. 



Obs. Mr. Hume separates the Tropic-bird inhabiting the Indian Ocean from the larger and widely-distributed species 

 Ph. cethereus, Linn., on account of its shorter tail and constant barred plumage, the old birds of the latter, according 

 to Messrs. Finseh and Hartlaub, losing this barring. He unites the birds procured in the Gulf of Oman (of which 

 the above is in essence his description) and those obtained at the Laccadives with the Eed-Sea bird, of which the 

 tail-measurement, as given by Heuglin, is 9-87 to 12-61. These measurements slightly exceed the above-quoted, 

 but are not, of course, to be compared with those of the Atlantic and Pacific form, the tails in which I find, on 

 examination of a series in Messrs. Salvin and Godman's collection, vary from 10-0 to 23-0 inches. The constantly 

 shorter tail (and the wing, from 10 - 5 to 11-2 inches) is perhaps sufficient ground for the separation of the Indian 

 form ; but I think the question of the barred plumage is doubtful. I find no white birds in Messrs. Salvin and 

 Godman's collection, and the former gentleman tells me he has never seen one. Is it not therefore possible that 

 the Pacific bird spoken of by Messrs. Finseh and Hartlaub may belong to an undiscriminated local form ? 



I doubtfully identify the Tropic-birds seen by Mr. Holdsworth with this species, as he affirms that they had tuhite tails. 



Distribution. — This Tropic-bird has been observed by Mr. Holdsworth during his annual cruises off the west coast of 



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