252 Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. [March* 



Hipposideros ater, Templeton. " Resembles the other" (speoris 1) " in every 

 thing but size and colour. The back is coal-black, the hair near the body dark 

 silvery-grey ; belly greyish-black ; the membrane deep black : tail one-half 

 longer than the femora, its tip exserted. Length If to 1-& in.; expanse 10 to 

 10| in.; tail 7 to 8in. Common in old buildings about Colombo." 



Among the gatherings of the past month, may be noticed particularly two re- 

 markably fine specimens, male and female, of half-grown Orang-utans, picked 

 up (when but just dead) after having been thrown away into the streets. These 

 have been stuffed, and now replace the specimens of corresponding age, but not 

 nearly in such fine condition, that we possessed previously. 



Also a new wading bird, of the genus Macrorhamphus, a skin of which Mr e 

 Jerdon sent me, upon loan, to describe some time ago, but of which I had not 

 hitherto published the memorandum I took of it. The following is from the fresh 

 specimen obtained in the Calcutta bazar, and Mr. Jerdon has only procured 

 one individual. 



M. semipalmatus, Jerdon. Larger than M. griseus, with the three anterior 

 toes connected at base by membranes, of which the inner is equally develop- 

 ed with lhat connecting the middle and outer toes of Himantopus Candidas 

 and H. leucocephalus, the outer being rather more so. Bill exactly as in 

 Scolopax ; its terminal fifth smooth and tumid in the living bird, becoming- 

 shrunken and papillose soon after death. Length 13in., of which the bill to 

 forehead measures 2Jin. ; expanse of wings 21 in. ; closed wing 6|in.; tail 

 2£in. ; tarse lfin. ; middle toe and nail l^in. ; hind-toe and nail -f^in. Bill 

 dusky, dull carneous towards the base of the lower mandible ; legs and toes 

 lead-coloured. Winter plumage ashy-brown above, with whitish-grey margins 

 to the feathers ; crown and lores dusky, the feathers but slightly margined 

 paler ; and divided apart by a whitish supercilium : throat, neck, and breast, 

 somewhat indistinctly pencilled with a zigzag subterminal dusky marking on 

 each feather, on a dull white ground ; increasing to three or four dusky bars on 

 those of the flanks and on the lower tail-coverts : belly and vent white : rump 

 and upper tail-coverts white, banded with dusky-black : tail-feathers also banded 

 with dusky-black, the dark bars being broader than the white ground : in the 

 uropygials, or middle pair of tail-feathers, the white disappears on the inner web, 

 and is reduced to a series of spots on the outer ; the primaries and their coverts, 

 and the winglet, are dusky ; the shorter primaries, to a partial extent, and the 

 secondaries and their coverts, being edged with white : the first primary a little 

 exceeds the second in length, and has the usual stout and conspicuously white 

 stem : under-surface of the wing chiefly white, except along its anterior borders. 



This bird is probably a sea-side species, like its chiefly American congener ; 

 which would account for its being so rarely brought to the Calcutta bazar, among 



