Birds of Celebes: Hirundinidae. 
357 
writers make other subdivisions. What is necessary to know is where the 
extremes of variation in particular directions are found; the intermediate forms, 
which probably compose the larger half of the species can then be indicated 
by hyphens connecting the names of the races between which they lie. Thus, in 
Japan Dr. Sharpe seems to have discovered the summer head-quarters of one 
extreme, in Europe another extreme is found, i. e. the typical H. rustica with 
the black breast-band unbroken: “there is never any difficulty in recognizing 
birds from Japan as unmistakeable H. gutturalis with the breast-band completely 
divided [by the chestnut of the throat breaking through it]; and I have never 
seen an intermediate or doubtful specimen from the Japanese Islands”. Cele- 
bes and the other East Indies are without doubt the winter habitat of the true 
H. rustica gutturalis^ and one of the Celebes specimens before us may be thus 
identified. Further, Sharpe records the typical rustica from Malacca, the Phi- 
lippines and Batchian — a record overlooked by Count Salvador! — and 
from Palawan and Borneo (Ibis 1888, 2U0; 1893, 561) and with Mr. Wyatt 
later from Celebes, Halmahera, Burn and Amboina (Mon. Hirund. pt. XVII, 
1893); other specimens from Celebes, Java, Luzon, etc., after the finding of 
these authors, do not admit of such positive identification, but are intermediate 
between the typical and the Japanese races like three others from Celebes and 
elsewhere before us. These are best indicated as H. rustica — gutturalis, a less 
clumsy method not being possible with the present system of nomenclature. 
The following literature relates to the occurrence in the Celebes Province of: 
Hirundo rustica gutturalis (Scop.) and H. rustica — gutturalis. 
a. Hirundo gutturalis (Scop.), (1) Wald., Tr. Z. S. 1872, VUI, 65; (2) Meyer, J. f. O. 1873, 
405; (3) Salvad., Ann. Mus. Civ. Gren. 1876, IX, 55; (4) Meyer, Ibis 1879, 128; 
(5) Salvad., Orn. Pap. 1881, II, 1; (6) Meyer, Isis, Dresden 1884, 6, 22; (7) 
Sharpe, Cat. B. X, 1885, 134; (8) W. Bias., Ztschr. ges. Orn. 1886, 1()8; (9) id., 
Ornis 1888, 580; (X) Sharpe & Wyatt, Mon. Hirund. pt. XVH pL (1893). 
b. Hirundo rustica (1) Bosenb., Malay. Archip. 1878, 271; (II) Sharpe & Wyatt, Mom 
Hirund. pt. XVH pis. (1893); (3) M. & Wg., Abh. Mus. Dresd. 1895, Hr. 8, p. 8. 
Figures and descriptions. Sharpe & Wyatt a X, b 71; Salvador! 5; Sharpe 7; 
W. B1 asius 8. 
Adult male (H. rustica gutturalis). Above glossy steel blue-black; wings and tail dusky, 
the rectrices, except the two middle ones, furnished with a large spot of white on 
the inner webs 5 — -10 mm from the tip, the outermost rectrices much lengthened and 
narrow, forming a deep fork; forehead, chin, and throat chestnut, on sides of 
neck a blue-black collar, broken through on the upper chest by the coloirr of the 
throat; under surface light pinkish buff (Macassar, (T, Jan. 1873 — C 510). Wing 
114 mm; tail (middle rectrices) 42; tail (outer rectrices) 93; tarsus 10, rictus 15. 
Sexes. They are similar (Sharpe). 
Immature. Like the adult, but the head above dusky brown; chin, throat, and forehead at 
base of upper bill cinnamon; a broad pectoral collar dusky glossed with blue-black 
(Macassar, (^f, Jan. 1873 — 0 571: apparently, H. rustica — gutturalis). 
Eggs. North India and Afghanistan — H. rustica — 3 — 6 in number; white to pale salmon- 
