XIV 
INTRODUCTION. 
shallow strait, is closer to that of South India than to the avifauna of any other part of the 
peninsula. Wallace, in his great work on the Distribution of Animals, considers the island 
of Ceylon and the entire south of India as far north as the Deccan as forming a subdivision of 
the great “ Oriental Region.” It is, however, in the hills of the two districts, which possess the 
important element of a similar rainfall, where we find the nearest affinities both as regards birds 
and mammals ; and this is exemplified by the fact of some of the members of the Brachypodidse 
and Turdidse (families well represented in both districts) being the same in the Nilghiris and 
the mountains of Ceylon, while many of the Timaliidse and Turdidse in one region have near 
allies in the other. For example, Malacocercus ( Layardia ) rufescens, Pomatorhinus melanurus, 
Alcippe nigrifrons, Garrulax cinereifrons, Myiophoneus blighi, Oreocincla imbricata, Turdus 
kinnisi, and Palumbus torringtonice in Ceylon are respectively represented in the hills of South 
India by Layardia subrufa, Pomatorhinus liorsfieldi, Alcippe atriceps, Garrulax delesserti, Myio- 
phoneus liorsfieldi , Oreocincla nilgherriensis, Turdus simillima, and Palumbus elphinstonii. 
But though this strong similarity in the avifauna of the mountains in question, as well as 
their geological characters, indicate a contemporaneous upheaval and enrichment with animal 
life of their surfaces, a similar connexion is found between the northern parts of the island and 
the low country of the Carnatic. Here, again, we have in the fossiliferous limestones of the two 
regions an undoubted connexion, and also an affinity in their avifauna, which differs totally from 
the mountain-districts on either side of the straits. The northern parts of Ceylon, as well as the 
south-eastern, both of which I shall speak of in my remarks on the geographical features of the 
island, may be considered to constitute an Indo-Ceylonese subregion, and are inhabited by the same 
species as the south-east coast-districts of the peninsula. Brachypternus puncticollis, Anthra- 
coceros coronatus , Malacocercus striatus, Pycnonotus hmnorrhous, Merops viridis, Pyrrhulauda 
grisea, Mirafra offinis, Turtur risorius, Buchanga atra , and perhaps Cursorius coromandelicus are 
species characteristic of the north of Ceylon and of Ramisserum Island and the plains of Tanjore, 
but which are not inhabitants of the damp Malabar district. On the other hand it is noteworthy 
that Gallus sonnerati and the Lesser Florrikin ( Sypheotides aurita), common in the Carnatic, 
have not yet been detected in North Ceylon. It is by way of the low-lying country of the 
Carnatic (the fauna of which, it may be remarked in passing, is allied to that of Central India) 
that the cool-season migrants enter the island of Ceylon, leaving numbers of their fellows in 
Southern India; and this forms an additional ornithological bond between the two districts. 
Some of these migrants come from the regions at the foot of the Himalayas, and tend to the 
supposition that there is a Himalayan element in the avifauna of Ceylon ; but this is but very 
slight, if, indeed, it should at all be recognized, for migratory species, such as Scolopax rusticula 
and Gallinago nemoricola (which only inhabit the upper ranges and the high mountains of 
Southern India, and whose locale depends solely on climate), cannot be taken into consideration. 
One genus ( Pachyglossa ) certainly does constitute a bond of affinity. The distinctness of the avi- 
fauna of the Southern-Indian and Ceylonese mountains from that of the Himalayas may be shown 
by the fact that most of the Himalayan typical Timaline genera, Suthora, Stachyris, Troclialopteron , 
