OCCASIONAL NOTES. 353 



( ' Stray Feathers/ 1879, p.p. 37, 151)- The series of 

 Malayan birds in the Hume collection, now in the British 

 Museum, is an extremely valuable one, and it is to be regret- 

 ted that Mr. DAVISON was never able, through political 

 obstacles, to reach the mountains on the eastern side of the 

 Peninsula and explore the high ridge or "backbone" which 

 runs down its entire length. Considerable speculation has 

 been excited respecting the fauna of these Malayan moun- 

 tains, because all the collections hitherto made in Malacca 

 have proved that, as regards the birds, there are very few 

 species which are not common to Borneo, Sumatra, and the 

 Malayan Peninsula. Sumatra, however, has always enjoyed 

 a certain distinction from possessing at least one genus — - 

 Psilopogon — peculiar to itself ; and, again, in the mountains 

 several Himalayan genera have been found with species 

 identical with, or only slightly differing from, those which 

 occur in the Eastern Himalayas and extend down the moun- 

 tains of Tenasserim. Many Malayan species range into the 

 southern portions of the last-named province ; but as regards 

 the Himalayan genera, such as Niltava, Liothrix, Pnospyga, 

 Sibia, &c, all traces of them are lost after leaving Tenas- 

 serim until they turn up again in Sumatra. 



Many prognostications have been made that when the 

 mountains of the Malayan Peninsula were explored, the 

 above-named genera and many others common to the moun- 

 tains of Tenasserim and Sumatra would be found to extend 

 along the eastern side of Malacca; but of this the first 

 actual proof has been furnished by Mr. L. Wray, who has 

 sent a small parcel of birds from tho mountains of Perak to 

 the British Museum. Although so few in number, the re- 

 velations which they disclose are of the greatest value, for 

 they show that in Perak, at least, and probably throughout 

 the mountain-range, there is a curious mixture of Himalayan 

 and High-Sumatran forms. Thus the Psilopogon, hitherto 

 supposed to be a peculiar Sumatran genus, is accompanied 

 by Rhinocichla mitrata (Ianthocincla mitrata, Auct. ), 

 another species hitherto believed to be confined in Sumatra; 

 and the Sibia is also the Sumatran S. simillima, and not 

 S. picata. The affinities of the Perak species being there- 



