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Show 1873.] OF THE ETHIOPIAN REGION. 597 pearance, the flanks also somewhat mottled, with black centres to the feathers; under wing-coverts white, streaked with black, the lower ones entirely black ; bill black ; feet brown, tinged with lead-colour ; iris dark olive. Totallength 15*5 inches, culmen 1*1, wing 7*4, tail 10*2, tarsus 1*05. Young. Above brown, the lower back and wing-coverts margined with pale rust-colour ; crest brown, with a slight greenish tinge on some of the feathers ; quills brown, with a purplish gloss on the inner secondaries ; tail purplish brown, with a greenish gloss near the base, the two exterior feathers tipped with white on the outer web ; under surface of body dull white, tinged with ochre on the abdomen and under tail-coverts, the throat and chest indistinctly marked with dull brown in the centre of some of the feathers ; under wing-coverts buffy white, the lower ones blackish, the quills white at the base of the inner web only, showing no external alar speculum ; bill horn-brown, the under mandible reddish. The southern bird is the largest, measuring 7*4 in the wing. The northern ones measure 6*5-7*1, but there is no difference in plumage. Hab. N.E. A F R I C A : along the Nile northwards to Dongola, in Senaar and all over the White-Nile district (Von Heuglin); Upper Lebka and Anseba valleys (Blanford) ; Waliko and Gabenaweldt-gonfallon, August 1868 (Jesse). W . A F R I C A : river Gambia (Mus. R. B. S.); Sierra Leone (Fraser); Fantee (Ussher) ; Denkera, Dec. 1871, and Jan. 1872 (Blissett). S.W. A F R I C A : Damara Land, Elephant Vley, Nov. 1869, and Otjimbinque, March 1863 (Andersson). S. A F R I C A : Swellendam (Cairncross); Limpopo river (Wahlberg). M y friend Mr. H. F. Blissett sent me the following note on a specimen which was obtained for him from the forest country of Denkera in the interior of Fantee:-"This I believe to be a very-rare bird indeed. From what I can gather from Aubinn, he has only seen one before, which Governor Nagtlas sent to Holland. He calls it a Nightingale; and m y own collector confirms the fact of its singing when the rain is coming on. It was shot in Denkera in December 1871 ; and I have ordered him to get some more specimens for you." Whether any credence can be given to the fact of this bird " singing " will be found some day by some European collector ; for the native accounts are unfortunately very untrustworthy, and it is quite certain that its rarity was exaggerated by Aubinn to Mr. Blissett; for he obtained one or two examples for Governor Ussher, and sent at least one specimen to Mr. Higgins. Mr. Blis-sett's bird being in a peculiar state of change of plumage, Aubinn may have referred to it iii the sense of only having seen one exactly similar bird ; for I know by experience that birds of all kinds which differ in sex or in young plumage, are always considered by the natives to be distinct species. 3. COCCYSTES JACOBINUS. Coucou huppe de la cote de Coromandel, Montb. Pl. Enl. vi. pl. 872 (1783). |