BIRDS OF EASTERN 



AND SOUTHERN ASIA. 



pean diurnal birds of prey are met with in In- 

 dia, many of them being much commoner in 

 this country ; and they are associated with nu- 

 merous other species unknown in Europe. The 

 sport of falconry is widely diffused over Asia, 

 even to the Miilayas ; but whether extending to 

 China and Japan, w^e are unfiware. It may 

 furiher be noticed that the " quarry" hawked 

 by Dr. L^yard's Bedouia companions on the 

 great plain of Mesopotamia, ami rightly enough 

 denominated by him a " Bustard," is no other 

 than the Houbara [Souhara Macqiieenii) of 

 Si idh and Afghanistan ; being a different spe- 

 cies from that of Spain and North Africa {H. 

 undulata ;) and it appears that the former has 

 most unexpectedly turned up, of late years, in 

 Enijland and Belgium, i( not also in Denmark. 

 The great spiny-tailed Swift of the Himalaya 

 {Acanthylis nudipes of Hodgson) was obtained, 

 a few seasons back, in England. Mr. Gould 

 identities this British-killed bird with iiis Ac. 

 caudactita of Ausiralia, but it appears identical 

 with the Himalayan species ; upon comparing 

 Hi(nala,yan specimens wiih Mr. Gould's plate, 

 no difference can be detected. The great Al- 

 pine Swift, (^Cypselus melba) is common to 

 the Himalaya, thti Nilgiris, and high mountains 

 of Ceylon, but the livtat A carahi/lis of tlie 

 Himalaya has never been observed in S. India, 

 and is replaced in the Nilgiris, Ceylon, and also 

 across the Bay of Bentjal, (in Penang, &c.) by 

 a distinct species, the Ac gigantea. Gold and 

 Silver Pheasants are inhabitants of China ; but 

 the Golden Pheasant, according to M, Tem- 

 minck, inhabits not only China and Japan, but 

 the northern parts of Greece, as also Georgia 

 and the Caucasus ; and it. has been met with 

 even in the province of Orenbourg. M. Deg- 

 land informs us, that M. Gamba, French Con- 

 sul at T:flis, met with this gorueous bird in 

 numerous flocks on the spurs of the Caucasus, 

 which extend towards the Caspian sea ; and 

 that now it has gone wild and multiplied in 

 some of the forests of Germany. In Southern 

 Asia, the birds familiarly known as ' Bulhuls' 

 must not be confounded with the Persian Bul- 

 bul, which is a species of true Nightingale 

 (Litscmm), a ijenns very closely related to some 

 of the small Thrushes of America. We have 

 no true Nightingale wild in India ; but the 

 ' Shama' Cercotr ichas macrourus, undonhteA\y 

 the finest song-bird of this part, of the world, is 

 not nnfrequently desii^nated the Indian Night- 

 ingale, a misnomer which only leads to confu- 

 sion. It is common to India and the Malay 

 countries ; and there is a second species (C. 

 luzoniensis) in the Philippines, and a third (C. 

 eryihropterus) iti Africa. We may remark t.hat 

 the Orocetes cinclochynclia is also termed Sha- 

 ma in the Madras Presidency. Our esteemed 

 Indian songster is le Merle tricolor de loiigue 



8 



queue of Levaillant (Oiseaux d' Afrique pl^ 

 114;). The Bhimraj {EdoUus paradiseus) is 

 popularly denominated " the Mocking-bird" by 

 Europeans. Several eminent naturalists per- 

 sist in ignoring the very great differences be- 

 tween ' Siorks' and ' Cranes,' in their appear- 

 ance, habits, anatomy, modes of breeding, 

 and everything, except that both happen to 

 be long-lcirged birds. They do so by designat- 

 ing the Hurgila or * Adjutant' {Leptoptilus 

 argala) « the gigantic Crane." The three or- 

 dinary Indian Cranes {Grus antigone, Gr. ci- 

 nerea, and Gr. virgo : the Gr. leucogeranos, 

 occur rarely in the North West Provinces. Now 

 the words Crane and Grus, and the Hindustani 

 names of the three common Indian species, Sa- 

 ras, Karranch, andKaJcarra, all have reference 

 to the loud trumpeting of these birds, which 

 have a curious internal conformation resem- 

 bling that of the Tru.nnpeter Swans : whereas 

 the Storks are voiceless birds, having actually 

 no vocal muscles, and can make no sound, but 

 l)y clattering their mandibles togetlier, which 

 they do pretty loudly. Ymix indica appears 

 to be met with in Afghanistan and Tibet. Mr. 

 Gould describes a kind of Nuthatch to inhabit 

 the Himalayan mountains towards Kashmir, but 

 the bird in question is unknown in (Jentral 

 India properly so designated. I'he Acroceplia' 

 lus arundinaceus {Sylvia turdoides of Tem- 

 minck), and the Acr. salicarius (S. arundinacea 

 of Temminck), and also the three common Bri- 

 tish species of Pliylloscopus, have been noted 

 by different authors as occurring in India ; but 

 the three Indian species are different. In India, 

 various instances occur of closely affined Indian 

 and European birds, which every ornithologist 

 would at once pronounce to be distinct : e. g. 

 Oriolns galhula and 0. Jcimdoo ; Lanius excu- 

 hitor and L. lalitora ; Troylodytes europoeus 

 and Tr. sui-himalayanus ; C erthia familiaris 

 and G. himalayana, 8fC. : and not nnfrequently 

 the exact European species inhabits India 

 in addition to another which would other- 

 wise be regarded as its counterpart or repre- 

 sentative, or according to the views of some 

 naturalists a mere local or climatal variety of 

 the same species : thus Circus^ Sivainsonii (the 

 palUdtis of Sykes) is regarded by Prof. Sciile- 

 gel as a local variety of C. cineraceus ; had he 

 said so of C. cyaneus it would be more intelligi- 

 ble, as the affinity is much closer with cyaneus ; 

 nevertheless, both Sivai7isonii and cineraceus 

 appear to be common throufihout Africa, as 

 both likewise are in India, inhabiting the same 

 districts, and each remaining ever true to its 

 distinctive characters ; while cyaneus also inha- 

 bits the vicinity of the Himalaya, together with 

 both the others. There are precisely the same 

 grounds for regarding the European Pliyllosco- 

 pus frochihis & Ph. rufns as being ' climatal' or 



