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0fo> tUe second Species of ZOSTEE OPS* inhabiting Ceylon* 

 By W. V. Legge, Esq., F. Z. S. Hon: Sec: B.A. S. (C. B.) 



The only mention, that I can find, of the other " White 

 Eye" or Hill Tit inhabiting Ceylon, is in Layard's Notes, 

 " Annals of Natural History" No. Ixx., page 267, under the 

 head of Z. Annulosus, Swainson ; he remarks that Kelaart 

 found it in the hills, but that he (layard) doubts its 

 distinctness from the common bird Z. Palpebrosus, Temm. 

 A glance, however, at the bird must, I think, convince even 

 the casual observer that it is a distinct species ; besides the 

 difference in coloration, it is a larger bird than its low-coun- 

 try relative, has altogether different notes, and differs from it 

 in its habits. Since reading my note on this bird before the 

 general meeting of the 7th November, based an a speci- 

 men presented last year to the Society's Museum by Mr. 

 Holdsworth, I have had the good fortune, during a tour in the 

 Central Province, of finding that it is widely distiibuted 

 throughout the Hill districts down to an elevation, in some 

 places, of 2,800 feet. I observed it in Pusselawa, Dimbula, 

 the Knuckles district, on Ilambodde pass, and. near Nuwera 

 Eliya, in some of which places it is very numerous. 



It affects the high jungle as well as the wooded 

 nullabs intersecting the hill patinas, and as far as my obser- 

 vation extends, I find that it does not usually associate 

 in large flocks, as does Z. Palpebrosus, but is generally 

 seen either singly or two. or three together, searching for 

 its food, in the active manner peculiar to its genus, among 

 the tops of low jungle bushes or in the lower branches 



* Since writing the above, I hear from Mr. Holdsworth, who 

 has lately sent a skin, of this bird to England, that he has identified 

 it as a new species, peculiar to Ceylon, and that he proposes to 

 call it Zosterofis Ceylonensis. In my formor M. S. S. note, submitted 

 for publication in this journal , I had fully described the bird, but 



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