1845.] Drafts for a Fauna Indica. 871 



above, all but its middle feathers successively more distinctly marked 

 with black about the middle, passing into greyish on the basal half, 

 and to white on the terminal, successively more strongly pronounced. 

 Irides crimson ; bare orbital skin white ; the bill black ; and feet dark 

 pinkish-red. Length thirteen inches by twenty or a trifle less ; wing six 

 inches and a half, or sometimes rather more. 



Common and generally diffused, frequenting hedges and trees in the 

 neighbourhood of cultivation, and even low bush-jungle : it inclines more 

 to be gregarious than the other species. To the eastward, however, it 

 seems to be unknown in Arracan. According to Mr. Strickland, the 

 identical species occurs in Northern Africa ; and it is likewise stated to 

 inhabit the south-eastern part of Europe, as Hungary, Turkey, and the 

 Islands of the Lower Danube.* In Southern Africa, it is replaced by a 

 nearly allied species, the Col. vinacea, Gmelin, to which Mr. G. R. 

 Gray refers T. erythrophrys of Swainson ; while Mr. Strickland iden- 

 tifies the latter with T. risorius, and considers T. semitorquatus of 

 Swainson to be the vinacea "\ Mr. Gray, again, does not mention semi- 

 torquatus of Swainson, but gives semitorquatus, Riippell, as distinct from 

 either. T. vinaceus is distinguished from T. risorius, by its generally 

 much darker colour, by having the under tail-coverts whitish instead 

 of deep ash, by its much broader black nuchal semi-collar, and by its 

 winglet and primary- coverts being dusky instead of pale ash-grey. It is 

 also rather smaller than the Indian species ; in which respect, and in the 

 breadth of the nuchal half-collar, the common tame cream-coloured (or 

 pale buff- backed) doves, which are abundantly bred in captivity both in 

 Europe and in India, agree with the South African, rather than with the 

 wild Indian species. As for Swains'on's two alleged species, I can identify 

 neither of them satisfactorily ; his figure of T. erythrophrys, is evidently 

 faulty in the colouring ; but he speaks of " the belly, flanks, vent, and 

 under tail-coverts, as " clear cinereous," which should distinguish it 

 from T. vinaceus, while its " broad black semi- collar, margined by a narrow 

 cinereous line," instead of a slight greyish-white one, should equally 



* Bull, de V Acad, des Sciences de Saint- Petersburgh, 1837, No. 46 ; as quoted in the 

 Rev. Zool.par la SocieU Cuvierienne, 1838, p. 293. 



f Vide Strickland, in An. $ Mag. N. H. 1844, p. 38; Gray's illustrated ' Genera 

 of Birds'; and Swainson's ' Birds of West Africa,' Vol. II., Nat. Libr. 



