1876.] THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS. 421 



PMJippines. Sonnerat's erroneous quotation of the title used by Buffon need not now have been 

 aUuded to, were it not that Buffon really employed as the title part of the native name given by 

 Brisson, and called it le Langraien, and nowhere does Buffon use the title attributed by Sonnerat. 

 Buffon's account (for it cannot be called a description) is taken from Brisson ; and he quotes the 

 volume and page of the ' Ornithologia.' As Sonnerat identified his species with that of Buffon, 

 and as Buffon manifestly refers to Brisson's species, we may assume that the same species was under- 

 stood by all three authors. Gmelin (S. N. i. p. 305), by adopting the Linnsean title for Brisson's 

 species, with which he associated that of Buffon, and by bestowing {t. c. p. 307) a separate title 

 on Sonnerat's bird, was the first author who suggested the idea of the Philippines (or rather the 

 vicinity of Manilla) being inhabited by two distinct species of Artmnus. If we turn to the two ibis, 1876, 

 original descriptions, we certainly find a discrepancy. For the dark-coloured part of his species P- 

 Brisson uses the word blackish [nigricante), whereas Sonnerat describes those portions of the 

 plumage as being black (noir). Gmelin (l. c.) correctly adopts these distinctions in his 

 description of L. leucorhynclms and of L. dominicaiius. If we refer to the plates, the shading of 

 Brisson's figure may be said to be consistent with his description ; Sonnerat's plate represents the 

 dark plumage as being inky black. The bird depicted by D'Aubenton (PL Enl. 9. f. 1) also has 

 the dark parts of the plumage coloured jet-black. A comparison of dates renders it impossible 

 that D'Aubenton could have figured from Sonnerat's specimen ; and the presumption is strongly 

 in favour of his having had Brisson's type before him ; and the title affixed by him, Pie-grieche 

 lie Manille, is the one first employed by Brisson. Buffon cites the plate as representing his 

 Langraien ; and, as already stated, Sonnerat relates that his Philippine example belonged to the 

 species mentioned by Buffon. 



If these discrepancies had been relied on by tlie older authors (not Gmelin, for he was 

 merely an indiscriminating compiler) as differentiating two Luzon species of Arfamus, I would 

 hesitate before asserting that they had described from examples of the same species. But 

 Dr. Finsch in no way relies on these discrepancies. Dr. Finsch takes his stand on Lanius manil- 

 lenst's, Briss. (=L. leucorhynclms, L.), described as being blackish, and unites the jet-black bird 

 of Sonnerat, L. pMUpiJensis, Scop. {—L. doinmicanus, Gm.), with it, and refers the Pelew bird 

 to them. If there are two species of Arfamus in the Philippines, one very dark-coloured, the 

 Pelew bird, the other lighter-coloured, the species of the Sunda Islands, the first must be 

 Sonnerat's (i. dominicamis, Gm.), the other Brisson's {L. leucorhi/nchus, L.). But Dr. Finsch 

 also unites with the Pelew bird Oci/jjicrus leucorhynchus, Temm., apud Kittlitz, " von den Sunda- 

 Inseln," although Kittlitz states (Kupfert. p. 29) he saw the same (that is, the Sunda-Islands 

 bird) in Luzon. The figure given by Kittlitz {op. cit. t. xxx. f. 1) certainly represents the light- 

 coloured known Philippine species—that is, the Artamus of the Sunda Islands. The Pelew bird Ibis, W6, 

 is also referred by Dr. Finsch to the Ocypterus leucorhynchus, Cuv., of Ilahn (Vog. aus As., Afr. 

 &c. pt. xix. t. 2) ; and the plate is characterized as excellent. Hahn's figure represents all the 

 dark plumage jet-black ; but he describes the head, neck, wings, and tail as being slate-grey, and 

 the back only as sooty black. Although styled a ''Jigura optima " by Dr. Finsch, the upper tail- 

 coverts in Hahn's plate are coloured black instead of white. Hahn gives the East Indies, 

 especially Java, as the range of the species he describes and figures. 



Now, putting aside the fact that there is no known species of Artamus whose dark shade of 



3i 



p. 136. 



