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Show 108 MR. R. B. SHARPE ON BIRDS FROM LABUAN. [Feb. 16, Family COLUMBIDAE. 56. C A R P O P H A G A B I C O L O R (Scop.) ; Salvad. I. c. p. 292. After reading Count Salvadori's remarks on this species and its allies, I was induced to compare the series in the M u s e u m to see how far they agreed with the conclusions arrived at by him in his new work on the ornithology of Borneo. He recognizes four species of this group, of which two are undoubtedly valid (C. luctuosa and C. grisea); and the question is whether C. spilorrhoa oi Australia is distinct from the ordinary G. bicolor oi Malayasia. N o w Professor Schlegel has united these two birds in one long series, duly noting the differences existing in birds from various localities; and his conclusions amount to the fact that in the Malay countries the under surface is, as a rule, pure white, that in the Australian birds there are black spots on the lower abdomen and under tail-coverts, and that in the intermediate localities there are gradations uniting these extreme forms, so that sometimes both spotted and unspotted birds were found in one and the same island. Count Salvadori duly admits the instability of the black spots as a character, but separates C. spilorrhoa on account of its having only twelve tail-feathers against fourteen in C. bicolor. It is by some accident that the Australian specimens examined by him only had twelve tail-feathers; for all those before m e have fourteen rectrices; and therefore Professor Schlegel most likely did not mention the number of tail-feathers simply because he saw no difference in this character between Australian and Moluccan examples. The amount of white on the outer tail-feather is, again, a character which varies exactly in the same degree and is not the same in birds from the same locality. The C. melanura of Gray was founded on Bouru examples which have very little white on the outer tail-feather, which is black for about the terminal third. I give the following list of specimens in the British Museum. Nicobars. A male collected by Capt. Wimberley on Nancowry Island (Jan. 24th, 1874).-Wings black, with the slightest possible shade of grey on the primaries. Tail-feathers 14, white extending to within 0*6 inch of tip of outer feather. No spots on abdomen. Siam. Two specimens collected by Mouhot.-Wings black, with scarcely any shade of grey on the quills. Tail-feathers 14, white extending to within 0*55 inch of tip of outer feather. Slight remains of black spots on vent of one specimen ; the other entirely white. Province Wellesley. One specimen.-Wings and tail imperfect; only very slight shade of grey on the former, the white extending to within 0*45 inch of the tip of outer rectrix ; under surface white, with remains of a blackish spot at tip of longest under tail-covert. Java. One specimen, purchased of M r . Stevens in 1861.-Wings black, with rather more grey than on the foregoing birds, the secondaries also washed with this colour. Tail-feathers 14, the white extending on outer rectrix to within 0*4 inch of its tip. N o black spots on the vent or under tail-coverts. In this bird the amount of white is more extended on one outer tail-feather than on the other |