1845.] Drafts for a Fauna Indica. 855 



Genus CARPOPHAGA, Selby (1835): Ducula, Hodgson (1836). 

 Dukul, or Dunkul, H. The Dunkals. 



These fruit pigeons are mostly of large size, with broad- soled feet and 

 strong hooked- claws, much as in the typical Hurrials, and a slender, 

 generally somewhat lengthened, bill, having the terminal third only of 

 its upper mandible corneous, and the plumage of the chin advancing 

 very far forward, underneath the lower mandible. In a few species the 

 base of the upper mandible expands to form a fleshy knob. Wings, in 

 all the typical species, adapted for powerful flight. The plumage of 

 the head, neck, and under- parts, and in some species, throughout, is 

 blent and glossless, and mostly of a delicate grey, or a vinous hue, with 

 never the peculiar burnish on the sides of the neck, so general among 

 ordinary pigeons ; but many species have the upper-parts, wings, and 

 tail, shining metallic green, which in some is bronzed or coppery, in 

 others varied with rich steel-blue ; hence, several are among the most 

 shewy of the pigeon tribe ; others, however, being simply black and 

 white, though all are alike handsome when viewed in the fresh state, 

 from the delicate beauty of the irides, bill, feet, and any nude skin about 

 the head, the exquisite colouring of which is lost in the dry specimen. 

 These birds are more especially developed in the great Oriental Archi- 

 pelago, where the species are very numerous, two only occurring in 

 India, and others in Australia and Polynesia. They are gregarious, like 

 the Hurrials, and keep exclusively to the great forests, more especially 

 to those of upland districts : and it would appear that they do not 

 generally lay more than a single egg, and certain species invariably but 

 one ; in which respect they resemble the celebrated Passenger Pigeon of 

 North America (Ectopistes migratoria). At least three sub-genera occur, 

 at the head of which may be placed Lopholaimus, G. R. Gray, founded 

 on the Col. antarctica, Shaw (v. ditopha, Tern.), of Australia ; then 

 follow the ordinary Dunkuls, of which the two Indian species are cha- 

 racteristic ; and finally a short- winged type, with bill and feet as in the 

 former, and colouring as in the division Chalcophaps (of the next sub- 

 family), to which I apply the appellation Dendrophaps. 



C. insignis : Ducula insignis, Hodgson, As. Res. XIX, 162: Carp, 

 cuprea, Jerdon, Madr. Journ. 1840, p. 12, and subsequently referred 

 by him to Col. badia, Raffles, ibid. 1844, p. 164. (Dukul, Nepal ; Dwn- 

 kul, H). Head, neck, and under-parts, pale ruddy lilach-grey ; the 



