MELANOPTERYX ALRTNUCHA 365 



Adult male. Jet black, with the base of all the feathers of the back of 

 the neck pure white, which shows through and forms a somewhat defined 

 white collar ; wings with the under surface paler and more dusky, inner 

 edges of the quills brownish ash and the coverts ashy black. " Iris pearl- 

 white, bill black, tarsi and feet brown " (Kemp). Total length 5-7 inches, 

 eulmen 0-75, wing 3-1, tail 20, tarsus 0-75. Denkera (Ussher). 



The White-naped Black Weaver inhabits West Africa, 

 where it ranges from Sierra Leone to the Niger. 



Mr. Robin Kemp, wliile at Sierra Leone, " found these 

 birds breeding in close company with a colony of G'uinamopteryx 

 tricolor, on a high tree in the Mission-ground at Bo. They sit 

 about in crowds together, and often huddle up in hue. A man 

 I knew shot thirteen of them with one cartridge." 



Dr. Biittikofer gives an interesting account of the breeding 

 of these birds in Liberia. During his stay at Schieffelinsville 

 he found a colony of about twenty nests, all hung closely 

 together from the lowest branch of a huge cotton-tree, near 

 his station, while the crown was occupied by a large colony 

 of Hijphantornis ciicullatus, the members of which constantly 

 attacked the nests of the former, and robbed the materials for 

 the construction or reparation of their own nests. On visiting 

 the place a few weeks later, the whole colony of M. alhiimcha 

 had left, evidently driven away by their intolerant congeners. 



In the British Museum there are five full plumaged birds 

 and one young one, collected by Ussher, probably from 

 Denkera, as he considered it to be decidedly scarce in Fantee. 

 Mr. Boyd Alexander, who obtained it at Prahsa and Fumsu, 

 writes: "Locally distributed, and found in small parties at 

 the tops of the highest forest trees. During the day, and 

 especially towards evening, the birds may be observed flying 

 from their high points of vantage after insects, and then 

 i-eturning to their perches in the manner of Flycatchers." 



From further along the coast it is known to me only by 

 two specimens from the Niger, both in the British Museum. 



