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Ethel F. Chawneb



Comysocoma victorini.


Above olive-green ; lesser wing-coverts purplish-blue ; a broad

medial stripe from the vertex to the nape and the body beneath

bright yellow. Colombia and Eastern Ecuador.


Compsocoma notabilis.


Above yellowish-olive ; lesser wing-coverts olive ; large nuchal

spot yellow ; body below orange-yellow. Western Ecuador.


These differences seem quite satisfactory, but Dr. Sclater

emphasizes the black chin of C. notabilis as its distinctive character !

I should have thought the description “ head black ” included the

chin. I believe it generally does.


All that Mr. Goodfellow tells us in ‘ The Ibis ’ for 1901 about

C. notabilis is : “ One male, apparently of this species, was obtained

on the lower part of the western side of Pichincha, at an altitude of

about 7000 feet.”


I am afraid that next to nothing is known about the wild life

of the species of Compsocoma ; so that, with the best intentions, I

fear that I cannot make this a lengthy article, as our Editor desires.*



THE STORY OF A BLACK KITE.


By Ethel F. Chawner.


Many years ago I spent some weeks at S. Jean de Luz in the

Pyrenees, and towards the end of my stay I was told that someone

in the town was very anxious to find a home for a pair of hand-reared,

large hawks, and in a weak moment consented to see them. The

butcher-boy, who was the go-between, came next morning with the

meat for the pension, driving two big, brown birds along the pave¬

ment before him, and summoned me from dejeuner to inspect them

and decide if they should come with me to England the following

week.



* [The turquoise blue of the head of the Purple-bellied Tanager is most beautiful,

and unfortunately appears too greenish in the coloured plate. The under¬

parts of the Black-chinned Mountain Tanager are also much more brilliant

in the living bird.— Ed.]



