THE COMMON DWARF BULBUL. 
203 
webs ; quills dark brown,, edged with pale yellow ; lores^ sides of the head 
and entire under plumage yellow. 
The male in winter loses all black above except on the tail and wings. 
Males which are not mature appear to want the black also both on the wings 
and tail. 
Iris yellowish white ; lower mandible and the margins of the upper 
nearly to the tip blue ; remainder of upper mandible black ; feet and 
claws plumbeous. 
Length 5*4 inches, tail 2, wing 2'4, tarsus '75, bill from gape '7 . The 
female is of the same size. 
The changes of plumage in this species and its races throughout the 
Indian continent and Burmah are little understood. The subject has been 
exhaustively treated by Messrs. Hume and Sharpe ; and I am not able to 
throw any further light upon the subject. The birds which occur in 
Burmah are mostly, as far as the males are concerned, intermediate between 
zeylonica and tiphia — that is to say, there is usually a considerable 
amount of black on the upper plumage. The adult male in the breeding- 
months has almost invariably the whole crown black, and generally a con- 
siderable portion of the back. Those birds which are not black on these 
parts in summer are, in my opinion, males which are not mature ; they 
breed, but they have not reached the final stage of plumage, which probably 
takes two or three years to acquire ; and consequently birds in this immature 
plumage are most frequently met with. 
The Common Dwarf Bulbul is abundant throughout Arrakan, Pegu and 
Tenasserim, not, however, ascending the hills to any great height. Capt. 
Wardlaw Bams ay also met with it in Karennee. 
Out of Burmah it is spread over the peninsula of India (except in the 
north-western portions, where an allied species, j^. nigrolutea, replaces it) 
and Ceylon. It is common in the Indo-Burmese countries, Siam and 
Cochin China ; and it extends down the Malay peninsula to Singapore. 
This pretty bird frequents orchards, low trees and brushwood, feeding on 
insects which are found among the leaves. It commences to breed in May, 
or probably earlier, making a beautiful cup-shaped nest of very small size, 
which it fixes in the fork or on the bough of a small tree at no great height 
from the ground. The nest is made of fine fibres and grass, and coated 
outside with cobwebs. The eggs, usually three in number, are greyish 
white, streaked with brown and reddish brown. 
