■:94 SPERMOSPIZA GUTTATA 



and was constructed of soft grass without any lining, and con- 

 tained two white eggs, measuring 0"76 x 0'52. He remarks 

 that in one of his male specimens the upper tail-coverts were 

 broadly edged with red ; probably this was the remains of the 

 immature plumage, for it appears to me that both sexes, when 

 young, have the same amount of dull red on the upper tail- 

 coverts ; but unfortunately the sex has not been recorded of 

 any of the immature birds I have examined. 



The species is fairly distributed throughout Liberia and 

 the Gold Coast, and is represented in the British Museum from 

 Sierra Leone, Ashantee, Wassaw, Denkera Forest, Cape Coast, 

 Accra and Abeokuta, but as it lives in pairs in the thick bush 

 and forest country, is only occasionally seen. On the Grold 

 Coast, in March, Buckley and I found them frequenting the 

 dense bush, appearing at times singly or in pairs on the narrow 

 footpaths. At Abouri Drs. Reicheuow and Liihder met with 

 a hen bird, attended by her young, in September. Mr. Boyd 

 Alexander procured the species at Prahsu, Dr. Buttner at 

 Bismarckburg, in April, and Mr. Baumann at the Misahohe 

 station in February and May. The most eastern range known 

 to me for the species is Abeokuta, where it has been procured 

 by Mr. Robin. 



Spermospiza guttata. 



Loxia guttata, Vieill. Ois. Chant, p. 103, pi. 68 (1805) Co7igo. 



Spermospiza guttata, Sharpe, Cat. B. M. xiii. p. 500 (1890); Kuschel, 

 J. f. 0. 1895, p. 336 egg ; Shelley, B. Afr. I. No. 449 (1896) ; Reichen- 

 Vog. Afr. iii. p. 102 (1904). 



" Fringilla pustulata, Voigt," Cuv. Thierr. i. p. 581 (1831). 



Spermospiza immaculosa, Reichen. J. f. 0. 1877, p. 29 Loango. 



Achtlt male. Similar to that of S. hamatina, from which it differs in the 

 upper tail-covei'ts being of the same bright glossy crimson as the throat ; 

 the sides of the head, below the eye, bright crimson, or washed with that 

 colour, and also in the upper mandible having broad orange red edges- 

 "Iris red ; eyelids white ; feet black, with the soles yellow." Total length 



