Page:The Fauna of British India, including Ceylon and Burma (Birds Vol 2).djvu/177

Rh of the vent, abdomen, and under tail-coverts narrowly margin. -d with white; tips to quills broader than in the fully adult. Early in the first spring the white margins and tips are cast and the full plumage donned.

Legs and feefc dark brown ; bill black (G. Ifenderson).

Length about 8; tail 2-1; wing 3'8 ; tarsus 1*15; bill from gape -95.

This species extends westward to Asia Minor, and is closely allied to the three races of Dipper which are found in Europe. It may be distinguished from them by the absence of rufous on the abdomen immediately next the white breast, and further by the brown of the mantle extending some distance down the back and blending with the colour of the latter. To the north, the present form tends to run into O. leucoyaster, in typical examples of which the whole lower parts are white. In some specimens there is a tendency towards G. sordidus, the white of the throat and breast being infuseated and occasionally these parts are quite brown.

Distribution. The Himalayas from Gilgit to Sikhim from 9000 to 14,000 feet or higher, according to season. This Dipper extends on the west to Asia Minor and on the east to China, and it has a very extended range through Central Asia.

709. Cinclus asiaticus. The Brown Dipper.

Cinclus asiaticus, Stcains. Faun. Bor.-Amer., Birds, p. 174 (1831) ; AV//rm, His, 1807, p. 120 ; Blanf. J. A. S. B. xli, pt. ii, p. 48 ; Hume, Cat. no. 347 ; Sharpe, Gat. B. M. vi, p. 314 ; Scully, S. F. viii, p. 281 ; id. Ibis, 1881, p. 437 : Gates in Hume's N. $ E. 2nd ed. ii, p. 112.

Ilydrobata asiatica (Swains.), BlytTi, Cat. p. 158 ; Horsf. $ M. Cat. p. 185 ; Jerd. B. I. i, p. 500 ; Hume, N. Sf E. p. 225 ; Hume $ Henders. Lah. to Yark. p. 188 ; Godw.-Aust. J. A. S. B. xlv, pt. ii, p. 203 ; Biddulph, Ibis, 1881, p. 52.

The Brown Water-'Ouzel, Jerd. ; Nambong karriak, Lepch. ; Cltubia i.akka, Bhut.

Fig. 42. Head of C. asiaticus.

Coloration. The whole plumage chocolate-brown, the edges of the feathers somewhat paler in places ; the eyelids covered with hite IVatlu-rs: wings and tail dark brown, edged with the sanio colour as that of the plumage in general, the later quills tipped white.

The young in March, just fledged, have the upper plumage grey, the feathers tipped with black and the subterminal portion more