122 
Letters, Announcements, ^c. 
latter is softer and silkier; and the chestnut is brighter every¬ 
where (but most conspicuously so on the throat and breast) 
in the dullest B. castaneus jthan the brightest B. javanensis 
or B. affinis. 
I say nothing now of the grey white-mottled birds from 
Malacca, and the similar, though immediately distinguish¬ 
able, ones from the Himalayas. I assert nothing as to the 
validity of Blythes B. affinis, nor as to the correct name that 
this or B. javanensis apud Blyth should bear. 
I merely assert that in the Malayan peninsula occur two 
forms, a larger and a smaller (both fully represented in my 
museum), agreeing alike with the descriptions and the types 
of B. javanensis and B. affinis, Blyth, and both absolutely and 
unmistakably distinct, and distinguishable at a glance from 
B. castaneus. 
Secondly, as to B. punctatus and B. moniliger. I have B. 
moniliger both from the Travancore hills and from Ceylon per¬ 
fectly identical. In no adult B. moniliger does the wing fall 
short of 4*7. In B. punctatus, on the other hand, of which 
several specimens have now, Mr. White informs me, been ob¬ 
tained, the wing appears to be always under 5*5 (in the type it 
is only 5‘3); and though unquestionably there is a strong 
family resemblance between the males of B. moniliger, as 
sexed by Mr. Bourdillion (for I have no really reliable sexed 
specimens except his), and B. punctatus as described (I have 
not yet seen the rufous form of this), the difference between 
the two birds in every dimension, and even in plumage, is such 
that no one who compares them can ever confound the two. 
One more point remains to be noticed. When referring 
to Mr. Hodgson^s bird, the type of Otothrix hodgsoni, I said 
it was certainly an adult female by dissection. I said this on 
the strength of Mr. Hodgson^s entry on the back of the plate 
in his own hand:— 
Darjeeling, towards Great Bunjeet, about 4000 or 3000 
feet. May 20, 1856. Female, young, and nest. Plumes 
full'^ &c. &c. 
Here follows a full description of structure; and he adds, 
^Woung like mature, but duller hues; nest nearly fiat, a 
