378 BULLETIN 15 3, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



1. C . n. naevius. — Senegal, Gambia, Gold Coast east through the 

 Sudan to Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Somaliland, south to the northern 

 side of the West African forest belt, northern Uganda, and across 

 Kenya Colony to the central part of Tanganyika Territory. 



2. C. n. mosaiiibicus. — Angola and Northern Rhodesia south to 

 Bechuanaland, the Transvaal and Natal, omitting the southwestern 

 part of the Union of South Africa (Cape Province north to the 

 Orange River). 



The series exhibits considerable variation in color and size. Per- 

 haps the most noticeable character is the width of the white shaft 

 stripes on the feathers of the under parts. In the extreme indi- 

 viduals the difference is very great, the width of these stripes rang- 

 ing from less than one millimeter on the one hand to over three milli- 

 meters on the other. The birds with the narrowest shaft stripes 

 appear to be darker, more rufous violet below than those with the 

 widest white streaks, and while this is partly an optical effect caused 

 by the relative abundance of white in the latter birds, it is not wholly 

 so. The upper parts also vary in color, the back being greener in 

 some, browner in others. All the birds collected by the Frick ex- 

 pedition have dark rufous heads, and Van Someren "- finds that 

 freshly ])lumaged examples from Kenya Colony have the heads 

 rufous, without any of the greenish tips to the feathers of the crown 

 found in fresh Senegalese specimens. It appears that the question 

 in his mind (although not expressed in writing) was the validity 

 of Shelley's form levaiUwnti^ described on the basis of ha\ing the 

 crown more rufous than in typical birds. However, he says that he 

 compared his specimens with a large series from Senegal and found 

 no constant difference. Furthermore, a male from Mwanza, Tan- 

 ganyika Territory (Loveridge collection) has the crown mixed 

 greenish and I'ufous brown in about equal proportions. At first sight 

 this specimen might be thought of as intermediate between the 

 typical, rufous-brown crowned form and the southern, green 

 crowned viosamMcus^ but another specimen from tlie same locality 

 is typical naevius in this respect. The white on the nape and hind 

 end of the occiput varies greatly in amount, and in some birds the 

 white feathers are very pale bluish terminally. 



The size variations are as follows: Male: Wing 168.5-195, tail 

 138-152, and culmen 39-42 millimeters. Female: Wing 179-188, 

 tail 133-147, and culmen 39-42 millimeters. 



The bird collected at Dire Daoua on October 19 is molting the 

 remiges and has new inner primaries and outer secondaries. How- 

 ever, the outermost primary is also new and about two- thirds grown 

 although the next four are still of the previous plumage. 



«Nov. Zool., vol. 29, 1922, p. 73. 



