850 Drafts for a Fauna Indica. [No. 168. 



coverts impending the tail, so that this green appears as a very con- 

 spicuous broad caudal band : the throat also is not weaker- coloured, as 

 in Tr. phanicoptera. Tr. chlorigaster, on the other hand, has the whole 

 under- parts green ; no trace of green upon the tail, except at its extreme 

 base, and the whole cap and ear- coverts are ashy, devoid (in fine males 

 at least) of the slightest tinge of green on the forehead. These are, in 

 fact, three osculant races, which, if commonly inhabiting the same 

 districts, would doubtless intermix and blend, like Coracias indica and 

 C. ajfinis, and likewise certain of the Kalidge pheasants (Gallophasis) ; 

 but within their own proper range of distribution, each continues true 

 to the colouring which distinguishes it from the others. To term them 

 local varieties of the same species, would not merely imply that the 

 three are descended from a common origin, but also that such changes 

 of colouring are brought about by difference of locality ; a notion which 

 is inconsistent with the fixity and regularity of markings we observe in 

 either race, over an extensive and diversified range of country. Tr. 

 phcenicoptera is a very abundant species in Bengal, Assam, Sylhet, 

 Nepal, and all Upper India, its range extending southward at least to 

 the foot of the mountains of Central India, where it would seem to be 

 equally common with the next, and intermediate specimens are met 

 with even in Lower Bengal. In Arracan it does not appear to have been 

 met with, but farther southward, in the Tenasserim provinces, it is 

 represented by its other near aftine, Tr. viridifrons.* 



Tr. chlorigaster, nobis, /. A. S. 1843, p. 167 : Tr. Jerdoni, Strick- 

 land, An. and Mag. N. H., 1844, p. 38: Vinago phanicoptera v. 

 militaris of Southern India, Auctorum. Similar to the last, except in 

 the particulars already mentioned. It replaces Tr. phcenicoptera in the 



* Capt. Hutton writes me word from Mussooree, that Treron phtsnicoptera is 

 " common in the Deyrah Doon, but never mounts into the hills, where it is replaced 

 by Tr. sphenura. Many of the Doon birds" he adds, "have come to be regarded 

 as hill species, from their commonly occurring in collections made by residents at the 

 different hill stations. Such collectors, however, entertain one or more shikarrees, who 

 start off sometimes to the Doon, sometimes to the interior of the mountains, just as 

 they happen to remember or to want any bright-coloured bird ; and when the col- 

 lection is brought in, the collector never dreams of asking where the birds were shot, 

 but puts them all down together as ' a collection from the hills.' Nepal being further 

 to the south-east then Mussooree, a greater elevation may be required to produce 

 the same temperature that we have; so that birds, which with us are found only in 

 the warm valley of the Doon, may perhaps in Nepal rise to a certain elevation 

 on the mountains !" 



