211



few stray silvery tips ; rest of mantle with silvery tips ; lessei

coverts and tips to median coverts as before. Remiges much

more blue than before the moult, becoming more blue as the

body is approached, the four cast primaries having the outer

webs purplish blue, the inner black with a faint wash of purple

towards the ends, but tipped with dusky black. The ends of

the shafts of the tail feathers, although somewhat knocked about,

were still clearly visible, and just about one-sixteenth of an inch

long. No brown feathers nor feathers with brown bases could

be detected, so probably they are a mark ot immaturity.


Owing to the struggles of the bird, I could not definitely

locate the semi-white feathers of the flanks and lower back ;

they are rather long, and got mixed and twisted up together in a

regular tangle. But I am of opinion that I detected one decided

change ; the dark portions of these feathers, or many of them,

seem now to be black without any shade of blue. These semi¬

white partly concealed feathers, and the breast feathers with

concealed white centres, not to mention other minor differences,

seem clearly to point to this bird being of a hitherto undescribed

species, which should be known, if the country of origin could

be made sure, as the New Guinea Whistling-bird.



[August 20.—My bird has fallen into wliat seems to be a full and

natural moult. I suppose that, owing to the voyage, change of climate,

&.C., the former moult was a deferred one. I notice that two large

Australian birds in my aviary, the Regent-bird and the Green Oriole, com¬

menced their annual moult about the same time. Nature is trying to set

things straight ; but the two moults succeeding one another so closely

must put a great strain on the bird’s constitution.—R.P.].



CORRESPONDENCE.



LETTERS ON THE BIRDS OF JAMAICA.


No. I.


Sir, —Lovely as Jamaica is, and richly though it rewards you for the

trouble of coming out to see it, I don’t think it a mine of wealth from an

avicultural point of view—so far, at least, as I have seen up to the present.

Quite the most prominent figure in the bird world is the Johnny Crow, and

having heard so much about his want of personal attractions I am agree¬

ably surprised, for he is quite decently good looking. He is about half as

big again as a raven, with a finer spread of wing, and flies very gracefully,

floating and balancing from side to side. Some people might object to his

raw meat head and neck, but the expression of his face is not disagreeable.

There is a price of £5 put upon his head, that is to say, it is valued at that

sum, in which you are mulcted if you destroy him; his services as a

scavenger being highly valued, and his occasional lapses from virtue, when



