Genus ANUROPSIS Sharpe, 1883.
Bill from nostril less than one-half the tarsus; nostril with an overhanging membrane; rictal bristles weak, the longest less than bill from nostril; wing very short and rounded; tail very short and soft, not more than one-half the wing; legs and feet very large, when outstretched extending well beyond the end of tail; tarsus about equal to tail; body plumage soft and decomposed.
503. ANUROPSIS CINEREICEPS (Tweeddale).
ASHY-HEADED WOOD BABBLER.
- Drymocataphus cinereiceps Tweeddale, Proc. Zool. Soc. (1878), 617.
- Anuropsis cinereiceps Sharpe, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus. (1883), 7, 590; Hand-List (1903), 4, 41; McGregor and Worcester, Hand-List (1906), 81.
Balabac (Everett); Palawan (Everett, Lempriere, Whitehead, Platen, Bourns & Worcester, Celestino).
Male.—Top of head and hind neck ashy gray, lighter on lores and ear-coverts; remainder of upper parts fulvous-brown, more rusty on outer webs of primaries and secondaries: chin, throat, and middle of breast and abdomen white; sides of breast, flanks, thighs, and crissum light tan or ocherous-brown, extending faintly across fore-breast. Length, 114; wing, 61; tail, 30; culmen from base, 18; bill from nostril, 11; tarsus, 27.
“Adult female.—(Puerto Princesa, Palawan, January, 1878; A. Everett; type of species). General color above dark fulvous-brown, with faintly indicated pale shaft-stripes to the feathers of the mantle; the plumage of the lower back and rump very full and lax, with dusky or silvery gray bases; lesser and median wing-coverts like the back, with the same pale shaft-lines; greater series dark fulvous-brown; quills dark brown internally, externally dark fulvous-brown, somewhat ashy on the outer webs of the primaries; tail-feathers dark fulvous-brown; crown of head dark ashy gray, the hind neck and sides of neck lighter ashy gray; lores and feathers round the eye ashy whitish; ear-coverts light ashy gray with whitish shaft-lines; cheeks white, with a narrow line of black along their upper margin; entire throat pure white, as also the entire abdomen; breast and sides of the body, thighs, and under tail-coverts light fulvous-brown, with paler shaft-lines on the feathers of the breast; axillars fulvous with white bases; under wing-coverts fulvous; quills dusky brown below, ashy fulvous along the edge of the inner web. ‘Bill brownish gray, the mandible white; legs pallid, the front of the tarsi tinged brown; iris burnt sienna-orange.’ (A. H. Everett.) Length, 144; culmen, 18; wing, 60; tail, 27; tarsus, 28. (Mus. R. G. Wardlaw-Ramsay).” (Sharpe.)
“Rare in the region collected in by us; a single male obtained. It measures: Length, 127; wing, 61; tail, 27; culmen, 20; tarsus, 27; middle toe with claw, 23. Iris brown; legs, feet, and nails pale flesh-color; upper mandible black, lower nearly white.” (Bourns and Worcester MS.)