Letters, Announcenienis, S^'c. 377 



some remnants of brownish colour ; the head is light greenish 

 blue ; the neck deep blue ; the nuchal patcli orange, a maxil- 

 lary stripe yellow ; the two short appendices of the hardly 

 conspicuous caruncle are white, washed with blue; 



These birds were presented to the Emperor by the Javan 

 Prince Manghohe Megoro IV. and his son, Prince Gondhoe 

 Sigwojo; they were bought in a harbour of Java or Sumatra ; 

 and the Princes asserted that they had been brought from 

 Timor. 



Should this habitat be correct it would be a fact of great 

 interest for geographical distribution, as at present no species 

 of Cassowary from the island of Timor is known. 



It is also not without interest that the Javan Princes 

 remarked that Timor in former times was in connexion with 

 the Australian continent. 



The specimens at Schoenbrunn agree very well with the 

 bird described and figured by Mr. Sclater'^in the year 1875, 

 which Avas transmitted to the Zoological Society of London 

 by Sir James Fergusson from New Zealand. This specimen 

 was, when very young, together with a similar one, obtained 

 in 1873 by the officers of H.M.S. 'Basilisk' from the natives 

 of Touan, or Cornwallis Island, in the Torres Straits, four 

 miles from the south coast of New Guinea, seventy miles from 

 the opposite coast of Cape York. The natives said that they 

 had caught the bird on the coast of New Guinea. 



Mr. Sclaterf believed it probable that this Cassowary 

 would belong to C. salvadorii, Oustalet ; but more recently 

 he seems of the opinion that the last-named bird would be 

 not specifically different from C. beccariiX. 



The specimens at Schoenbrunn are also (allowing for 

 their difference of age) in accordance with the descriptions 

 and figures given by Signors D'Albertis and Salvadori § of 

 several individuals of C. beccarii from the Fly River. 



Yours &c., 



Vienna, May 1879. Pelzeln. 



* P. Z. S. 1875, p. 527, pi. Iviii. (head and neck). 



t P. Z. S. 187S, p. 214, note. I Ibis, 1879, p. 96. 



§ "Catalogo degli uccelli raccolti di L. M. D'Albertis durante la 

 seconda e terza esplorazione del flume Fly negli anni 1876 e 1877 " in 

 ' Annali del Museo Civico di Geneva, xiv. (1879), p. 1 20. 



SER. TV. VOL. III. 2 E 



