Page:The Fauna of British India, including Ceylon and Burma (Birds Vol 2).djvu/35

Rh Niltuva vivida (SwinA.), anuil Shurne. Cat. B.M. iv, p. 4G3 (part.) ; Gates, B. B. i. p. 2JM5.

Niltava oatesi, Salvadori, Ami. Mas. Civ. Gen. (2) v. pp. 514 (1887), 578 (1888).

Coloration. Male. Forehead and lores deep black ; crown, nape, rump, upper tail-coverts, lesser and median wing-coverts shining cobalt- blue ; buck and scapulars dark bluish black: winglet and

Fig. 7. Bill of C. oafesi. primary-coverts black ; greater coverts and quills black, edged with blue ; tail black, the outer webs suffused with cobalt-blue ; region of eye and ear-coverts black, the latter bordered posteriorly by a band of cobalt-blue running up to the nape ; chin and throat black suffused with blue ; remainder of lower plumage, axillaries, and under wing-coverts chestnut.

Female. Forehead, lores, round the eye, cheeks, chin, and upper throat rufous, speckled and irregularly barred with brown; under tail-coverts and a large patch on the throat, the axillaries, and under wing-coverts clear yellowish buff; remainder of lower plumage ashy olive suffused with buff; crown, nape, and sides of neck ashy brown ; remainder of upper plumage olive-brown with a fulvous tinge ; tail brown, suffused with rufous on the outer webs.

Legs, feet, and claws dark to blackish brown ; soles yellowish ; bill black ; iris deep brown to reddish chocolate (Hume). Length about 7'5 ; tarsus -7 to *8 ; bill from gape about -8. Males from Tenasserim have wings varying from 3*7 to 4, tails 3 to 3-7 ; males from Manipur have wings varying from 3-9 to 4, tails 3-1 to 3-3. In the females the wing is 3'7, and the tail 2-8 to 3-2.

C. vividus from China differs from the present species in being much smaller, the wing in males varying irom 3'3 to 3'5 and tail 2'6 to 2*8 ; in females the wing is 3*3 and the tail 2'5. The male has the upper parts of a much more brilliant blue. The female differs merely in si/<-.

I have examined the type of C. oatesi, and find it the same bird as the one which Hume identified with doubt with c. vividus, and of which there are numerous specimens in the Hume collection from Manipur and Tenasserim.

There is a female specimen of a Cyornis in the Hume collection from Tenasserim, which I cannot identify with any known species. It differs from the females of C. oatesi and C. vividus, among other things, in wanting the conspicuous yellowish-buff patch on the throat. It is probably the female of an mult -scribed species, and