Page:The Fauna of British India, including Ceylon and Burma (Birds Vol 2).djvu/161

Rh tail dark brown, the ijuills all tipped with white and edged with Muish. In summer most, if not all, of the whitish fringes and subterminal bars are cast, and the bird is nearly uniform blue.

Female. After the autumn moult the upper plumage, together with the wings and tail, resemble the same parts in the male, but are of a very dull blue ; the lower plumage is pale buffy white, each feather subterminally margined with black, the under wing-coverts, axillaries. and under tail-coverts barred with black. In summer most of the whitish fringes and black bars are lost.

The nestling closely resembles the adult female, but has the white fringes to the feathers broader.

Iris hazel ; eyelids plumbeous ; bill blackish hora ; mouth yellow ; feet black ; claws dark horn.

Length about 9-5; tail 3-4; wing 4-9; tarsus 1-2; bill from gape 1*2.

Distribution. This species, without any admixture of red in the lower plumage, is found in the winter throughout the whole Em- pire. It extends to Southern Europe and Northern Africa. The birds which are found in India and Burma appear to breed in Afghanistan, Kashmir, and probably other parts of the Himalayas, Turkestan, Tibet, and Western China.

Habits, $c. This Hock-Thrush frequents open, and by preference rocky, country, and it is not unfrequently found near buildings. Colonel C. H. T. Marshall found a nest of this bird at Murree in a low stone wall in June. The eggs are described as pale blue speckled with brownish red, and measured about 1*1 by "75.

Genus MONTICOLA, Boie, 1822.

The genus Moidkola differs from Petropliila in the proportion between the length of the wing and tail, the former in Monticola being twice the length of the latter. The Thrushes of the two are quite alike in habits and in general type of coloration.

694. Monticola saxatilis. The Rock-Thrush.

Turdus saxatilis, Linn. Syst. Nat. i, p. 294 (1706). Monticola saxatilis (Linn.), Blyth, Cut. p. 1(55; Blanf. Ibis, 1870, p. 4C6 ; Hume $ Hmders. Lah. to Turk. p. 190 ; Scully, S. F. iv, p. 139; Hume, S. F. vii, p. 379; id. Cat. no. 351 ter ; Bicldulph, Hi*, 1881, p. 53 ; Scully, Ibis, 1881, p. 439 ; Secbo/.m, Cat. B. M. v, p. 313.

Orocetes saxatilis (Linn.}, Horsf. fy M. Cat. i, p. 189.

Coloration. Male. The entire head and neck blue; back, scapulars, lesser wing-coverts, and rump blackish blue; the centre of the back occupied by a large white patch ; lower plumage, upper tail-coverts, and tail chestnut, the middle pair of tail-feathers with their terminal half brown ; median and greater coverts and quills dark brown, the coverts and secondaries narrowly tipped with