Page:The Fauna of British India, including Ceylon and Burma (Birds Vol 1).djvu/388

 344 TIMALIID.i:.


 * lora nigrolutea Marshall, S, F., iv, p. 410 (1876) (Meerut).
 * jEgithi7ia nigrolutea. Blanf. & Oates, i, p. U32.

Vernacular names. The same as for yEgithina t. tiphia.

Description. — Male breeding. Upper back bright golden yellow, delicately fringed or stippled with black; remaining upper parts black, the yellow showing through more or less on the lower back; tail broadly tipped with white; scapulars, lesser coverts and greater coverts black, the latter tipped with white and the median coverts wholly white; quills black, narrowly margined with gi'eenish, the outer secondaries tipped with white and the inner tipped and margined with white; sides of head and neck and whole lower plumage bright yellow; under wing-coverts white. Male in non-breeding plumage loses all or nearly all the black on the upper parts which become dull greenish yellow.

Colours of soft parts. Iris dark brown; bill horny plumbeous, the culmeu darker; legs and feet light plumbeous.

Measurements. Total length about 130 to 140 mm.; wing 60 to 66 mm.; tail about 44 to 50 mm.; tarsus about 17 to 18 mm.; culinen 10 to 11 mm. Female. AVhole upper plumage greenish yellow; the upper tail- coverts black, fringed Mith green; tail ashy-green, the central pair of rectrices nearly all ^ bite and the remainder broadly edged with white, yellowish-white or greyish-white; rest of plumage like that of the male but the black of the wings replaced by blackish brown.

Distribution. Takes the place of jE. t. tiphii and ^E. t. humei to the north-west of India. It is found in Cutch, Ilajputana where it overlaps the range of ^. t. humei for some distance, Southern and South- Western Punjab, North-West Provinces; occasional in the north of the Central Provinces and north of the Ganges as far as Behar and the .Santal Parganas, much over- lapping the range of vE. t. tiphia. Some authors consider both this bird and the last to be merely geographical races of ^githina tijjhia, but their actual breeding ranges overlap so constantly without a corresponding intergrading of form that it seems imperative to give them the status of full species. Nidiflcation. Exactly like that of ^githina tiphia. T-enty- four eggs taken by Barnes, Kemp and General Betham measure 17-1 X 13-1 mm.

Habits. Those of all the rest of the genus. Genus MYZORNIS Hodgson, 1843. The genus Myzornis contains one species of brilliant green plumage, an inhabitant of the higher portions of the Himalayas.