TICKELL^S HORNBILL. 
97 
black or dark plumbeous ; claws horn-colour. Young male : bill yellow, 
basal half greenish ; orbital skin straw-yellow ; iris grey ; legs greyish 
green; claws horn-colour. Adult female: bill yellowish, irregularly 
blotched with greenish ; orbits dull brownish yellow, with a livid patch at 
the hind corner o£ each eye ; iris light brown ; legs dull livid plumbeous ; 
claws horn-colour. Another female, apparently immature : skin round eye 
brownish ; ridge of upper mandible yellowish horny, remainder of the 
bill dirty brown ; legs dark brown ; iris brown ; claws black. 
Male : length 29 inches, tail 12*5, wing 13, tarsus 1*9, bill from gape 
4-6 to 5*2. Female : length 27 inches, tail ll'S, wing 12, tarsus 1'8, bill 
from gape 4. 
The above descriptions are taken from a beantiful series of birds in 
Captain Bingham^s collection. Mr. Hume states that the female differs 
from the male in having the lower plumage earthy brown, and in having 
the amount of white in the tippings of the wings and tail reduced in extent ; 
but two females in Capt. Bingham^s collection are absolutely like the males 
in plumage except that one, of w^hich it is noted that it was caught on the 
nest, has the lower surface a dull ferruginous brown. This is due, I think, 
to the peculiar habits of the nesting female, who never leaves the nest the 
whole time incubation is proceeding. The feathers, under these circum- 
stances, must necessarily become dnll coloured by abrasion, but otherwise 
there is no difference in colour between her and the male. 
TickelFs Hornbill is remarkably local, being, so far as is at present 
known, entirely confined to the tract of country in Tenasserim lying to the 
east of Moulmein. Messrs. Davison and Darling and Capt. Bingham met 
with it at various places the narues of which are carefully recorded in their 
writings ; but the area may be described as extending from the head of the 
Thoungyeen river to its junction with the Salween, and right across the 
valley from ridge to ridge. 
This Hornbill, according to all accounts, is one of the most wary of its 
tribe except at the breeding-season, when it appears in some measure to 
put aside its fears. In the many instances in which Capt. Bingham found 
the nests they were situated quite low down in holes of trees, and the 
male birds were easily approached. The breeding- season is in February 
and March ; the eggs vary in number from two to five and are white. 
These Hornbills are apparently arboreal and frugivorous, never descend- 
ing to the ground. 
A. austeni, from the Cachar hills, described by Dr. Jerdon from a speci- 
men procured by Col. Godwin- Austen, appears to differ from A. tickelli 
in being larger and in having the throat, sides of the neck and the bases of 
the primaries white. 
I have not been able to examine the type, which is said to be in the 
British Museum. 
VOL. ir. H 
