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Show 592 MR. R. B. SHARPE ON THE CUCULIDAE [Julie 17, the back spreads and occupies the rufous cross bars, while it is also apparent that the green bars on the tail, always irregular in shape, merge and occupy the whole feather. Below, the metallic shade of the spots becoming dimmed, the latter break up into frecklings and streaks, and finally disappear; but the bars on the sides become intensified, and more boldly developed. The greater coverts, which showed very slight indications of this change in the younger stage, now become conspicuously marked with white. The dark green portion of the outer tail-feather becomes much more pronounced than in the former stage. The change in colour on the head from cinnamon to purplish brown seems to take place by a moult, and not by a change of plumage as in the rest of the upper surface. Whether the full metallic dress is attained without any actual moult I have no evidence to show; but it seems to m e by no means improbable. Adult.-Above metallic green, changing to golden green, sometimes with a coppery gloss, according to the light; a streak down the fore part of the head, and a distinct eyebrow, white ; ear-coverts coppery green ; cheeks, sides of neck, and underparts white, the sides of the body as well as the under wing- and tail-coverts barred, the sides of vent streaked with dull metallic green ; wings metallic green above, like the back, varying with the light, the inner greater wing-coverts and the quills externally spotted with white, the primaries more minutely ; under surface of quills ashy brown, with oval spots or bars of white on the inner web ; lateral upper tail-coverts externally white; tail metallic green, all except the two middle feathers tipped with white, the outermost spotted with white on both webs, vanishing towards the centre feathers ; " bill dusky above, horny beneath ; legs dusky ; iris and orbit scarlet " (Blanford). Total length 8*5 inches ; culmen 0*7; wing 4*25 ; tail 3*4 ; tarsus 0*65. Hab. N.E. A F R I C A : Commonest of the Emerald Cuckoos, rarer on Upper White Nile and Blue Nile, and only a few examples obtained from Gondokoro and Fazogl. Appears early in rainy season, and leaves in September and October (von Heuglin). W . A F R I C A : river Gambia (MM*. R. B. S.) ; Goree (Mus. Lisb.) ; Fantee (Ussher); river Volta (Ussher); Cameroons (Crossley); Gaboon (Verreaux); Kattenbella (Sala). S . W . A F R I C A : Benguela (Monteiro); Damara Land (Andersson). S . A F R I C A : The Karroo (Vic-torin) ; Natal (Ayres) ; Traansvaal (Ayres). E. A F R I C A : Zanzibar (Kirk). N o difference has been shown to exist between the sexes of this little Cuckoo; and it is quite probable therefore that the birds said to be the females of G. klaasi and C. smaragdineus are after all only the young birds. 10. CUCULUS KLAASI. Le Coucou de Klaas, Levaill. Ois. d'Afr. v. p. 53, pl. 212 (1806); Sundev. Crit. o m Levaill. p. 47 (1858). Cuculus klaasi, Steph. Gen. Zool. ix. pt. 1, p. 129 (1815); Gray, Hand-1. B. ii. p. 218 (1870). |