416 THE BLACK-TAILED GODWIT. 
A SMALL representative race of this species, the Eastern Black- 
tailed Godwit (Z. melanurotdes, Gould; L. brevifes, Gray), 
occurs in the Malay Peninsula, China, Japan, Mongolia, Chinese 
Tibet, Eastern and Southern Siberia, and extends through 
Sumatra, Borneo, the Philippines. (P. Z. S., 1878, 288) Ceram, and 
probably all or most of the islands of the Archipelago to 
Australia. 
Many authorities deny specific rank to this form, and if 
specific rank were never accorded on the score of difference 
in size, I might agree in this view, for there appears to be 
absolutely no difference in plumage ; but the difference in size 
seems very great. The smallest male of @gocephala, not mani- 
festly by the plumage a gute young bird, that I have ever 
been able to meet with, had the following dimensions :— 
Wing, 7°5 ; tarsus, 2°85 ; bill at front, 3°65. 
This was an exceptionally small bird. Contrast this with the 
similar dimensions of an old male melanuroides, which we 
shot near Malacca. 
Wing, 7°41; tarsus, 2°59; bill at front, 2:9. | 
No one ever saw anything like a perfect adult of @gocephala, 
let alone an old bird with worn claws, approaching even these 
dimensions. And the bill is not only so much shorter, it is 
altogether slenderer and more delicate. 
I think it probable that stragglers of this small form may 
appear in Eastern Assam and onthe Southern Tenasserim coast, 
and hence my particular notice of it. 
