OCR Text |
Show 76 MR. R. B. SHARPE ON THE [Feb. 2, The type is NEODREPANIS CORUSCANS, sp. n. Not quite full-plumaged. Entire back, upper tail-coverts, and tail metallic steel-blue, with a slight purple lustre on the rump and upper tail-coverts; head dull yellowish green, with a few steel-blue feathers appearing, showing that the crown becomes metallic like the back; wing-coverts and quills black, externally edged with yellowish green, some of the coverts becoming metallic but a little greener than the back, the innermost secondaries metallic steel-blue like the back ; ear-coverts blackish ; entire under surface of body yellowish, mottled with black, all the bases to the feathers being of the latter colour; under wing-coverts, sides of body, and edge of wing bright yellow. Total length 3*7 inches, culmen 1*1, wing 1*85, tail 0*9, tarsus 0*55. It is much to be regretted that this pretty little bird is not quite in full plumage ; but the colour of its metallic upper surface shows that it is not a Mascarene or African Sun-bird, with nearly every one of which I am acquainted. It is, moreover, evidently the type of an entirely new genus, and undoubtedly distinct from every Sun-bird known to m e or represented in the Museum. The single example known was sent by Mr. Crossley. Family TIMELIIDJE. OXYLABES XANTHOPHRYS, sp. n. Above dull olivaceous brown, the head darker brown, all the feathers of the crown margined with dusky blackish, wing-coverts coloured like the back, the greater series clearer brown and more resembling the secondaries; quills blackish, washed with clear and somewhat rufous brown, the primaries inclining to olive-brown near the base; upper tail-coverts and tail dull reddish brown, waved with numerous cross bars of dusky brown ; lores and a very broad eyebrow bright yellow, extending backwards to the sides of the neck ; feathers in front of the eye blackish ; ear-coverts dull brown, washed with olive like the head ; under surface of body bright yellow, the sides of the neck and of the breast washed with brown, the flanks and under tail-coverts olive-brown, as also the under wing-coverts, the edge of the wing bright yellow ; bill light yellowish brown, dark brown at the base of the culmen; feet pale fleshy brown. Total length 6*5 inches, culmen 0*65, wing 2*75, tail 3*1, tarsus 1*05. A single specimen of this new bird is in Mr. Crossley's collection. It seems to m e to agree well enough with Oxylabes to be placed in that genus, though in colour it is strikingly different from O. madagascariensis, the typical species. BERNIERIA ZOSTEROPS, sp. n. Above dull olive-green, more dingy on the head, a loral stripe and a circlet of feathers round the eye bright yellow ; feathers between the bill and the eye black ; ear-coverts dark green, with bright yellow shaft-stripes ; entire under surface of body bright yellow, the sides |