— 73 — 



The extent of the red on the forehead varies very much 

 in different individuals. As a rule it does not extend farther 

 back than to a line with the front edge of the eye. Still, this 

 red patch in some of them is considerably larger and sometimes 

 stretches a good bit behind the farther edge of the eye. "Whether 

 this is connected with the age of the birds or not 1 am not in 

 a position to decide. 



The young bird lacks this red patch on the forehead, wings 

 and the tibia (Reich enow) but has the crown and neck 

 purely green, without any mixture of either brown or cobolt-blue, 

 found in the old birds. Further, the lower wing coverts are 

 not uniform green as in old birds but are furnished with a 

 prominent gold-yellow border, ihen again the feathers of the tail 

 both on the upper and lower surface are brownish red at the tips, 

 inside these, greenish brown a d then the same colour as in 

 the old birds. 



I have not found any differences in size between male and 

 female, but I have males which in the various measurements 

 are larger than the females and vice-versa. 



Irides in adults; nearest the pupilis a narrow yellow ring, 

 which in its turn is encircled by another of red; in juv. dirty 

 yellow; bill yellowish with dark ridge and point, upper mandible 

 dark-grey, (sometimes black); legs greyish yellow or citron-yel- 

 low with under-surface of the toes black, in juv. grey. 



I^oicephalus meyeri saturatus Sharpe. — Bull. Brit. Orn. CI. 

 vol. XI, 1901, p. 67. 



3 (5(5 ad. 24. 7., 26. 7., 27. 7,; 3 QQ ad. 17. 5., 24. 7., 26. 7. 

 Mount Elgon 7.000 feet. 



To this sub-species of F. meyeri Grant (Ibis 1915, p. 260) 

 and Someren (Nov. Zool. 1918, p. 267) refer JP. m. virescens 

 Rchw. and F. m. nyansae Neum. But Someren says in op. 

 cit. p. 266 "So much variation occurs in these birds that it is 

 almost impossible to correctly place any one specimen unless 

 the locality is given." 



I agree with Someren that these birds vary very consi- 

 derably and that it is therefore difficult to fix the sub-species, 

 especially if the characters, which should be characteristic for 

 the sub-species in question, are not constant but are probably 

 only individual variations, as in the present case. But I cannot 

 agree that the form always is fixed if the locality is given. Such a 

 procedure may lead to incorrect definitions and conclusions. It 

 should rather be so, that if the characters of the respective 

 forms are constant and good, and each one thus a good geogra- 

 phical sub-species, one might without much difficulty be able to 

 fix them and also, on that account, almost establish from what 

 zoo-geografical province they probably come. Just the fact that 



