A SMALL representative race of this species, the Eastern Blacktailed
Godwit (L. vielanuroides, Gould; L. brevipes, Gray),
occurs in the Malay Peninsula, China, Japan, Mongolia, Chinese
Tibet, Eastern and Southern Siberia, and extends through
Sumatra, Borneo, the Philippines. (P. Z. S., 1878, 28S) Coram, and
probably all or most of the islands of the Archipelago to
Australia.
Many authorities deny specific rank to this form, and if
specific rank were never accorded on the score of difference
in size, I might agree in this view, for there appears to be
absolutely no difference in plumage ; but the difference in size
seems very great. The smallest male of eegocepkala, not manifestly
by the plumage a quite young bird, that I have ever
been able to meet with, had the following dimensions :—
Wing, 7'5 ; tarsus, 2'8j ; bill at front, 365.
This was an exceptionally small bird. Contrast this with the
similar dimensions of an old male meUinuroides, which we
shot near Malacca.
Wing, 7-41 ; tarsus, 2^59 ; bill at front, 29.
No one ever saw anything like a perfect adult of czgocephala,
let alone an old bird with worn claws, approaching even these
dimensions. And the bill is not only so much shorter, it is
altogether slenderer and more delicate.
I think it probable that stragglers of this small form may
appear in Eastern Assam and 011 the Southern Tenasserim coast,
and hence my particular notice of it.