IN WESTERN LIBERIA, 199 



Spermospiza guttata, Boc. Oru. d'Ang. p. 349. 



Hab. West Africa, from the Casamanze to the Congo. 



Adult male and female, collected near Buluma. 



Although botli mentioned specimens have not been shot 

 together at the same day, I believe them to belong to 

 the same species , the more as the large collection of both 

 spotted and unspotted specimens from the most diflerent 

 localities, contained in the Leyden Museum, do not furnish 

 the least evidence for their being two different species. 

 Both specimens are shot in brushwood, where they keep 

 close to the ground , living upon grass seeds and insects. 



Iris red , eye-lid milky white , bill metallic cyan-blue , 

 tip and edges minium-red, feet sooty brown. 



This species does not breed in colonies, as its nest was 

 found alone in the underwood of high forest lying in a 

 fork four feet above the ground. It had the shape 

 of a ball of about 12 cm. diameter with the aperture 

 on one side near the top , and is carelessly built of soft 

 stalks and panicles of grass, without any lining. The nest 

 contained two white eggs, which measured 1,9 cm. in 

 length and 1,3 cm. in width. 



Pyrenestes personatus. 



Pyrenestes personatus, Du Bus, Bull. Acad. Sc. Brux. 

 1855, I. p. 151; — Hartl. Orn. W. Afr. p. 139. 



Hab. West Africa: Senegambia (Du Bus), Liberia, Ga- 

 boon (Rchw.). 



A fine series collected near Robertsport. 



1 found a little colony of these birds in a swamp-grove 

 near Robertsport, at the inner slope of the strand-dune, 

 with about 10 nests, from one of which I have caught an 

 adult male and a breeding female. The nests are very 

 large and consist of a heap of dead reed-leaves, sitting 

 very well hidden in the fork of a thickly leaved, low 

 bush, about 4' above the swamp or the water. A narrow 

 aperture in one side of the nest leads to the cup which 



Notes from the Leyclen JMuseuTn, Vol. VII. 



