Lagonostida jamesoni taruensis v. Somerea. — Bull. Brit. 

 Orn. Club, vol. XL, 1919, p. 54. 



1 (5 ad. 27. 4. Mombasa. 



Id the Mombasa country I saw this form a few times. 



The specimen is in full dress and agrees with v. Someren's 

 description except that the centre of the abdomen is not black, 

 but brownish yellow with an uneven, pale red tint. Under tail- 

 coverts are black with brown tips. No white spots on the sides 

 of breast. 



Wing 44 mm. tarsus 12 mm. 



Irides dark-brown; bill bluish grey; legs black. 



Neisna quartinia nyansae Neum. — Journ, f. Ornithol. 

 1905, p. 350. 



8 ^(5 ad. 21. 5.-15. 6.; 1 Q ad. 12. 6.; 1 ^ juv. 24. 6. Mount Elgon. 



On the eastern slopes of Elgon this race was very common 

 up to 8.500 ft. As a rule it was found in the bush vegetation 

 along the small mountain streams flowing here and there. It 

 was seen quite as often in single pairs as in small flocks of 

 6—10 individuals. I even saw it very often in the Solanmn 

 and Convolvulus thickets on the sunlit slopes. 



Among these 9 specimens in full dress there are rather 

 great variations in the extent of the yellow patch of the belly. 

 In some this patch stretches on to the breast, in others it does 

 not extend so far up. 



Reichenow (Vogelf. Mittelafr. Seengeb., 1910, p. 336) 

 throws out the suggestion that iV. q. nyansae and N. q. hili- 

 mensis Sharpe are perhaps only different sexes or old dresses 

 of one and the same form, but Grote (Journ, f. Orn. 1921, 

 p. 129) emphasizes the dift'erence between them and points out 

 that the latter has a darker grey head, the back and under 

 surface being also darker (see Ogilvie-Grant: Zool. Res. 

 Ruw. Exp., 1910, p. 303). Grote gives the wing-length of Mi- 

 mensis from Usambara as 41 — 45 mm. (in the majority of cases 

 43 mm.) and Neumann (op. cit.) gives 42—43 nam. for nyansae, 

 but points out at the same time that his race is smaller than 

 the former. The difi"erence in size between these two forms 

 (wing, total length etc.) is obviously negligible, at least judging 

 from these figures, but they may best be distinguished by the 

 colours. After comparing my specimens with those at the Berlin 

 Museum, I came to the same result as Grote and therefore 

 consider both these forms good. 



My specimens from Elgon are without any doubt nyansae 

 but, as appears from the following table, the measurements for 



12* 



