SPHEN’OCl
SPHENOCICHLA HUMII.
Hume’s Wedge-billed Wren.
Heterorhynchus humii, Mandelli, Str. F. 1873, p. 415.
Stachyrirhynchus humii, Hume, Str. F. 1879, p. 95.
Sphenocichla humii, Sharpe, Brit. Mus. Cat. vi. p. 283 (1881: d ).
T h is extraordinary bird was described by Mr. Mandelli from specimens procured in Native Sikhim, and
was named by him Heterorhynchus. This title, however, had already been employed by Lafresnaye, and
Mr. Hume’s name of Stachyrirhynchus would have had to be u sed ; but before the latter was published,
Colonel Godwin-Austen and Lord Tweeddale had described a second species from Munipur, which they had
called Sphenocichla; and there can be no doubt that this is the correct generic name to be employed.
Mr. Hume’s proposed title is a very good one for expressing the affinities of the genus; for the wedge-
shaped bill is very similar to that of Stachyris; and at the same time the absence of bristles to the gape
proves that it is a true Wren, and its place in the family is probably close to Pnoepyga.
As th$ birds were lent me by Colonel Godwin-Austen as two distinct species, I have figured S . roberti
as different from S . humii; but I must express great doubts as to their being really two species, and
Mr. Sharpe considers them undoubtedly identical.
The following is a description o f S . humii, taken from the British Museum ‘ Catalogue of Birds,’ where
Mr. Sharpe has described it as the male of the species.
“ Adult male. General colour above scaly, the feathers being brown in the centre, edged with black, the
feathers on the head and mantle with buffy-white shaft-lines, less distinct on the lower back and rump, the
dorsal feathers indistinctly waved with narrow blackish cross-bars; upper tail-coverts reddish brown,
narrowly barred with indistinct blackish cross lines ; wing-coverts like the back, edged and obscurely barred
in the same manner; some o f the greater coverts more ochraceous brown towards the tip s ; quills blackish
brown, obscurely barred with lighter brown and black externally, the bars a|13ttle more distinct towards the
end of the secondaries; upper tail-coverts and tail rather more reddish brown, numerously barred with
blackish brown, the bars about twenty-one in number; forehead blacker than the head, with very distinct
white shaft-streaks, the lores and sides o f the crown similarly coloured; an eyebrow of light-ashy feathers
tipped with white, drawn from above the eye to the sides of the neck, which is also mottled with the same
ashy-spotted feathers; ear-coverts and cheeks blackish, narrowly streaked with white shaft-lines, as also the
fore part of the ch eek s; under surface of body blackish brown, the feathers of the throat and breast
obsoletely margined with dull ashy, producing a scaly appearance; chin with distinct white shaft-lines;
centre o f breast ashy, the lateral feathers blackish, tipped with a sh y ; flank-feathers and vent blackish,
tipped with fulvous brown; under tail-coverts entirely fulvous brown; under wing-coverts light fulvous
brown, edged with blackish, the outer ones more ashy; quills brown below, ashy fulvous along the edge of
the inner web. Total length 6’3 inches, culmen l ’O, wing 2 '7, tail 2 ’6, tarsus 1*05.”
The Plate represent a male bird in two positions; and the figures are drawn from a fine specimen obtained
in Native Sikhim by Mr. Mandelli and lent to me by Colonel Godwin-Austen, in whose collection it now is.
The figures are of about the natural size.