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Description of the Psittacus Fieldii. 199 



Parrot, of a form and species totally dissimilar from all those 

 hitherto received from the southern hemisphere. To the liberality 

 of my friend Barron Field, Esq., I am indebted for the only spe- 

 cimen, so far as I can learn, now in this country ; and it is 'm 

 justice to the scientific acquirements of that gentleman, that I here 

 commemorate it by his name- 



The superb family of PsitlacidcBt wherein nature has united 

 all that is lovely in colour and graceful in form, has engaged the 

 attention of two eminent ornithologists now no more, MM. Le«- 

 vaillant and Kuhl. The latter has, with great judgment, divided 

 the numerous species it contains into natural and geographic 

 groupes ; and my friend Mr, Vigors intends shortly to investigate 

 and arrange the whole family according to the quinary system of 

 Mr. M*Leay : the subject is inviting, and cannot be in better 

 hands : I shall therefore merely give such a description of the 

 bird before me, as may enable others to ascertain the station it 

 may be found to occupy among its congeners. 



PSITTACUS Fieldii. 



Rufous-headed Parrot, 



P, viridis ; capite castaneo'fusco ; alls infra nigris ; tectricibus 

 interioribus cceruleis ; caudd rofundatd. 



Green ; head cliestnut-brown ; Avings beneath black ; under wing- 

 covers coerulean-blue ; tail rounded. 



In size, this bird is rather larger than the Ceram Lory; the bill 

 is comparatively thick and strong ; the upper mandible has a 

 slightly sulcated line down the middle of the culmers ; while the 

 under mandible is longer than it is deep ; the gonix ascending, 

 and the tip thick and obtuse, like that forai seen in the short-tailed 

 parrots of the New World ; the under part is obsoletely triangu- 

 lated ; the cere is entirely naked, and the aperture of the nostrils 

 very large, and perfectly round. The entire plumage of the head 

 and ears is a deep red or chestnut-brown ; much paler on the 

 lower part of the cheeks and chin, where it becomes tinged with 

 green. Ail the remaining upper plumage is of a rich and change* 



