Page:The Fauna of British India, including Ceylon and Burma (Birds Vol 1).djvu/383

 ^GITIIIXA. 339 27th March and contained one and tliree eggs respectively. In ground-colour these are a greyish white and tiiey are marked' longitudinally with grey streaks and here and there with one more I'eddish. They measure between 17-3 x 14-1 mm. and 20-2 x 15-3 mm.; the former is presumably abnormally small.

Habits. The Great lora is more of a forest than a garrien bird, at the same time in Mergui and other places it is known to enter compounds and orchards. It is said to keep to the higher trees in preFerence to scrub- and bush-jnngle, to have a fine whistling call and to be entirelv insectivorous in its diet. Genus ^GITHINA Vieill., 1816. The birds of this genus are very closely allied to the last but have a smaller bill. Like the hist they have two moults in the year, the male assuming a breeding plumage at the early moult. Key to Sjiecies. A. Tail black or green throughout. a. Upper plumage either greenish yellow, or black, or a mixture of both E. tiplda, p. 339. h. Upper plumage entirely dark greeu Ai. riridissima, p. 343. B. Tail tipped with white ^S nir/rolutea, p. 344. ^githina tiphia. This species is found over a very w ide range of countr}' from Ceylon, almost throughout India, Burma, Siam, the Malay Penin- sula, Java aud Borneo and, as might be expected, shows a very great variation in plumage, especially in the breeding season. Birds from the tSouth of India and Ceylon are very like those froui the extreme South of Burma and from the Malay Peninsula, as is so often the case with species which' extend from one end of the Indo-Burmese horseshoe to the other. Gradations from North to South are, however, very gradual and it is difficult to define where the meeting lines of the various races are to be found and on this account it is only possible to divide the species into very few well-defined geographical races. We have, however, the following subspecies which seem worthy of attention : —

(1) A verv black-backed bird from Ceylon aud South Travaucore, possibly reappearing in South Malaya;

(2) A bird with a much greener and less black back, which occurs over the whole South-East, East and North-East India, Burma, etc.; and

(3) A third form in which the male has no black in the non-breeding season and in which the female is duller and paler than those from elsewhere. z2