Male. Crest, head aud throat ending in a narrow point on the middle of the breast, 

 scarlet ; hiud margins of ears black ; upper part of neck, back, rump, upper tail- 

 coverts, scapulars, great-and lesser wing- coverts, sides aud patch on sides of chest, 

 slaty grey; primaries black, outer edges silvery grey, first black ; secondaries broadly 

 edged with pale grey ; tail black, ouler ones margined and tipped with pale grey; 

 centre of feathers on hind neck, narrow band across back of head uniting with sides 

 of neck, breast, abdomen, under wing-and tail-coverts and thighs dirty white ; under 

 surface of wing and tail pale grey : iris reddish brown ; bill pale brown, darkest at 

 base of culmen, lower mandible nearly white ; legs dark brown : length 7-2, wing 4-1, 

 tail 3-6, tars. I'O, culm. 055. 



Male. Nearly adult. Similar, but with a few blackmargins on the feathers of the chest, 

 thighs pale grey. 



Female. Similar, but the scarlet of the head not so brilliant. 



Toung Bird. Similar, with head aud throat pale rufous-brown, intermixed with scarlet ; 

 above tinged with pale olive-brown ; primaries and secondaries dark brown ; sides and 

 flanks tinged with pale brown : bill and feet as in the adult. 



Ohserv. The adult male and female are almost identical in colour and markings, the young 

 are easily distinguished by the pale rufous head and throat, brown primaries and 

 secondaries. In confinement they become more or less black all over, especially when 

 fed on hempseed. 



In the early days of BufFon, Latham, Gmelin, the older ornithologists and 

 authors, this very beautiful Cardinal, was considered to be the male, or a 

 variety of the more abundant species the Dominican Cardinal, so well 

 known in Brazil and the adjacent countries to the south and west, and 

 easily distinguished from the present bird by the absence of a crest, they 

 had reason to suppose it was the male, on account of the sexes of this 

 peculiar group of birds being so alike, that it is only by dissection this 

 can be determined. 



The area occupied by this bird is very extensive, being found through- 

 out the middle and southern portion of Brazil, throughout Paraquay, the 

 northern portion of the Argentine Republic, La Plata and extending its 

 range into the great ravines of Bolivia. 



With regard to its habits Burmeister says that it " Inhabits singly or 

 in pairs, the damp bushy plains on the borders of the large rivers in the 



