800 Asiatic Society. [No. 128. 



4. E. Rangoonensis, Gould ;— probably the Malabar Shrike or Drongo of Buffon 

 and Sonnerat:* ante, p. 172. Figs. 8 and 9. 



JV. B. Either the first or second of these three species (probably the first of them) 



is the Cuculus Paradiseus, Lin., the Coucou vert huppe de Siam of Brisson, or 

 Coucou a longs brins of Buffon, as founded on a drawing by a M. Poivre, who 

 had figured the feet to be zygodactyle : the same artist had in like manner mis- 

 represented the Pica ( Cyanocorax ) erythrorhynchos, which accordingly has been 

 described as the Coucou bleu de la Chine, en langue Chinoise, San-hia, of Brisson and 

 Buffon, and the Cuculus Sinensis, Linnaeus. This species was observed in Chusan 

 by Dr. Cantor. 



Subgenus Melisseus folim Bhringa), Hodgson. 



5. E. remifer, Temminck ; tectirostris, Hodgson ; Rangoonensis (?), 



apud Horsfield : ante, p. 169. Figs. 3 and 4. 



Subgenus Prepopterus folim Chaptia), Hodgson. 



6. E. ceneus, Vieillot; muscipetoides, Hodgson. Figs. 20 and 21. Butchanga 



of the Bengalees. 



Subgenus Dicrurus (Vieillot), G. R. Gray, olim Buchanga, Hodgson. 



7. E. viridescens (?J, Gould : ante, p. 173. Figs. 10 and 11. 



8. E. balicassius (Linnaeus); — affinis, Nobis (ante); — Javanese forficatus (f), 

 Horsfield: ante, p. 174. Figs. 12 and 13. A fine adult, recently obtained from 

 Singapore, has the wing five inches and three-quarters long, middle tail-feathers 

 four inches and three-eighths, and the outermost above seven-eighths of an inch 

 additional ; the tip of the latter curling nearly as much as in E. Fingah, from which 

 species this differs in its shorter and much less deeply forked tail, and in the superior 

 size and much greater vertical height of the bill, the upper ridge of which is also 

 considerably more angulated.f In both the abdominal feathers of the once moulted 

 birds are tipped with greyish-white, which totally disappears in the plumage 

 of full maturity. I doubt whether that now under consideration occurs in India, 

 but it seems to be the common species of the Malay countries generally, including 

 the Phillipine Islands (from whence it was originally described by Brisson and 

 Buffon), and it is said to extend even to Australia (apud Vigors, Lin. Trans. 

 XV, 211). 



9. E. Fingah, Shaw (the young),— Indicus, Stephens (the adult) ; — albirictus, 

 Hodgson; — balicassius, Nobis (ante), as also of Jerdon and other writers on the 

 Ornithology of peninsular India. Figs. 14 and 15. Shaw appears to have had no 

 further authority for this species than Edwards's figure of the " Fork-tailed Indian 

 Butcher-bird," which he erroneously refers to Lanius cozrulescens of Linnaeus; and 

 holding this opinion, he had no right to clog our systems with a superfluous name: 

 quoting, too, the Linnaean definition of cozrulescens, and perhaps following Edwards's 

 description, or, it may be, describing from that author's plate, it would seem that 

 the most has been made of the whitish tips to the abdominal feathers of the young 

 of our present species, thus bearing out the mal-identification with cozrulescens. 



* " II manque de huppe." — Buffon. 



t This bird is the Corvus balicassius of Linnaeus, and in truth its beak partakes much of the 

 corvine form, so that the species might be styled with propriety the Crow-billed Drongo, as the 

 next might be equally well named the Shrike-billed Drongo. 



