214 Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. [No. 2. 



2. L. C. Stewart, Esq. now of H. M. 61st Regt., Wuzeerabad. Selec- 

 tions, from two collections, of such specimens as were required for the 

 museum ; their place to be supplied by examples of various Bengal and 

 other species, not required by the Society. 



From a small collection, chiefly of birds, procured in the Madras Pre- 

 sidency, we have obtained a good skin of Sciueus haceotjeus, Forster, 

 shot near Bangalore, and precisely identical with Ceylon specimens : long 

 ago we received on loan a Travancore example of this species from Mr. 

 Walter Elliot ; and we possess a bad skin of it from the Nilgiris : so 

 that its occurrence on the mainland of India is now thoroughly establish- 

 ed. Also horns of both sexes of the so called Nilgiri Ibex (Kemas 

 hylocritts, Ogilby), the representative in the JNilgiris of the Tehr or 

 Jharal of the Himalaya (K. jemlaicus). Of birds, the rare Paeus nu- 

 chalis, Jerdon, from a tope near Bangalore ; and a specimen in winter 

 dress, shot near Madras, of Lobipes hyperboeeus, (L.) ! It is the 

 first instance recorded of the occurrence of this arctic or sub-arctic (and 

 even rare British) species in India, where it can only be considered as an 

 exceedingly rare and accidental straggler ; and only one instance is 

 known of the occurrence of the affined phalaeopus fulicaeius, (L.), 

 in India, — a specimen in winter dress, and very lean, but with the plu- 

 mage in fine order, having been procured by myself in the Calcutta pro- 

 vision bazar, brought with Snipes, &c, on May 11th, 1846. 



Mr. Stewart's second collection is a most extensive one, procured chiefly 

 in the vicinity of Landour, and in the Deyra Doon. We derive from it 

 several skulls of mammalia, including that of an adult male Langur, 

 Peesbytis schistaceus, Jlodgson, considerably larger than (and well 

 distinguished from) those of adult males of the Bengal Hunuman, Pe. en- 

 tellus ; also a fine skull of a Chiru, Panthalops Hodgsonii. 



rhospiza punicea (scarcely separable from the last.generically), and the Leuco- 

 sticte group, followed by the European Linnets and Redpoles, Siskins and Green- 

 finches, Serins, Goldfinches, &c. ; the typical red plumage passing into green and 

 yellow, — and finally the various forms of true Fringilline Grosbeak, and the Chaf- 

 finches, Snowfinch, and northern Snowfieck, which last (as aforesaid) has no 

 immediate affinity for the Emberizinje, nor has the Alpine Snowfinch (Monti- 

 fringilla nivalis) for Leucosticte. It is remarkable that the Chaffinches 

 (restricted Fringilla) are partly insectivorous, and feed their young with insects ; 

 as the Sparrows also do : whereas the Linnets, Greenfinches and affined forms (of 

 which the domestic Canary may be considered typical,) rear their young upon 

 macerated vegetable diet ejected from the craw or dilatation of the {esophagus, 

 and appear never to touch insect-food of any kind. 



