59. Suthora atrisuperciliaris

59. Suthora atrisuperciliaris.

The Black-browed Crow-Tit.

Chleuasicus ruficeps, var. atrosuperciliaris, Godw.-Aust. P. A. S. B. 1877, p. 147; Hume, S. F. v, p. 499; Godw.-Aust. J. A. S. B. xlvii, pt. ii, p. 15. Chleuasicus ruficeps, Bl. apud Anders. Yunnan Exped., Aves, p. 638, pl. xlvii, fig. 2.

Coloration. " Bright ferruginous on the head, same colour, paler, on the nape and ear-coverts ; back and wings pale olive-brown ; quills tinged rufous ; tail brown; a narrow black streak over the eye; beneath dull white with an earthy tinge. Legs dark plumbeous.

" Length about 6 ; wing 2.85; tail 3.3 ; tarsus 0.90; bill at front 0.43 inches.

" Larger than Ch. ruficeps and not so white below." (Godwin-Austen.)

Distribution. Discovered at Sadiya, Upper Assam ; and procured at Ponsee, on the borders of Western China, by Anderson.

This species appears to me to be fairly distinct from S. ruficeps, and to be its eastern representative. I have examined four specimens of the Sikhim bird and find that in none of them is there more than a faint duskiness over the eye; in no case is there anything approaching the black shown on Anderson's plate of S. atrisuperciliaris. Hume's suggestion that this latter is the male and S. ruficeps the female is, I think, untenable in the face of the fact that all the other species of this family have the two sexes alike.*