1845.] or littte known species of Birds. 183 



compose the disk : under parts deeply tinged with the hue of the 

 back, but an admixture of pure white on the belly and under tail-co- 

 verts ; and the breast and sides of the belly have some tolerably broad 

 black central streaks to the feathers, those of the latter being also va- 

 riegated with transverse pencillings : the unspread tail has its bands ob- 

 solete ; and the bars on the outer webs of the primaries are indistinct. 

 A male and female, apparently in second plumage, which I procured 

 alive, have the ferruginous colour of the upper-parts somewhat deeper, 

 though less bright, with the black centres to the feathers much more 

 developed, and these are copiously variegated with cross-pencillings 

 everywhere but on the forehead, crown, and the aigrettes ; the under 

 parts have also a much greater admixture of white, and the black 

 streaks and pencillings are considerably more developed ; primaries 

 and tail conspicuously banded. The colouring of the nestling plumage 

 would, however, seem to approximate more to that of the adult (and this, 

 accordingly, may be likewise the case in Sc. lempiji): it is distinguished 

 by the usual weak and unsubstantial texture of the clothing feathers, 

 and by the narrower and more pointed form of the wing-primaries. 



6 S. pennata, Hodgson, mentioned in J. A. S. vi, 369, and re- 

 cognised in Mr. G. R. Gray's list as distinct from the European 

 Sc. zorca, to which it is nearly allied * : Strix bakkamoena, (?) Pen., 

 and indica (?), Gmelin, founded on a rude drawing of a Cingalese speci- 

 men, no doubt inaccurate as regards the " scarlet" colour of the irides, 

 the exceedingly small size given as that of nature (about four inches 

 long), and also the excessively contrasted barring of the primaries ; 

 likewise in the lower portion of the tarsi being represented as bare. 

 The present species is smaller than any of the foregoing, its wing 

 measuring from four inches and five-eighths to five and a quarter 

 long ; and it so nearly resembles Sc. sunia in its general characters, 

 that 1 formerly suspected it would prove but a grey variety of that 

 bird : its under-parts are marked very like those of Sc. sunia, and 

 there is a certain admixture of ferruginous especially about the breast, 

 and a decided tinge of the same chiefly upon the large alars and 

 their coverts, and seen elsewhere more or less upon the upper parts, 



* A specimen of Sc. zorca is there noted from China ; and this species has long been 

 stated to occur in Northern Asia ; at least the Strix pulchella, Lin., of Russia and 

 Siberia, has been currently identified with it. 



