330 PLOCEPASSER PECTORALIS 



are bold, noisy, chattering birds, and appear to breed both in 

 the antamn and spring, for at both of these seasons they were 

 observed haunting tlieir nests, which are untidy bunches of 

 fine grass or teff attached to the ends of the lower branches 

 of trees." 



Plocepasser pectoralis. (Pi- 37, tig. i.) 



Philagrus pectoralis, Peters, J. f. 0. 1868, p. 133 Inhavibanc. 



Plocepasser pectoralis, Eeichen. Yog. Afr. iii. p. 13 (1904). 



Ploceipasser pectoralis, Sharpe, Cat. B. M. xiii. p. 247 (1890) ; Shelley, 

 B. Afr. I. No. 470 (1896). 



Adult male. Similar to P. mahali and P. mdanorhynchus, from both of 

 which it differs in having the crop mottled with large dark brown centres 

 to the feathers. It resembles P. mahali in the under surface of the wing 

 having the coverts and broad inner edges to the quills buff, and P. melano- 

 rhynchus in the black bill and the brown flanks. " Iris claret colour ; bill 

 black; tarsi and feet brown." Total length 6-5 inches, culmen 0-65, wing 

 3-8, tail 2-5, tarsus 1-0. 3 , 28. 11. 98. Zambesi (Alexander). 



Peters' Sparrow-Weaver ranges over Eastern Africa be- 

 tween 8" and 24° S. lat., from tlie Rufiji Eiver to Inhambane. 



This is the eastern representative of P. malmU in Southern 

 Africa, and is represented in the British Museum from Tete 

 (Kirk), Zumbo (Alexander), iS^pimbi (Whyte), Limondi (Sharpe), 

 and Lindipe in Angoniland, where General Manning found it 

 was known to the natives as the " Pelengaya." 



The type was discovered by Peters at Inhambane. 



Mr. Boyd Alexander, in his interesting notes on the birds 

 observed by him during his expedition up the Zambesi, writes : 

 "Wherever the woods were composed of Gojpaifera mojMne 

 this species was numerous, distributing itself in colonies, each 

 selecting a clump of trees, w'hose outside branches the birds 

 festooned fi'om top to bottom, generally on the lee side, with 

 their nests. These ' weaveries ' were nearly always located 

 near the confines of a village or close to a native path, their 



