3% SITAGRA MONACHA 



3Ialc in full i^lumage. Similar to S. lutcola, from which it differs only 

 in the colours being slightly darker and brighter and the black extending 

 a little further over the crown. Iris brown ; bill black ; feet greyish brown. 

 Total length 4-5 inches, culmen 055, wing 2'25, tail 1-6, tarsus 07. J , 

 14. 2. 72, Cape Coast (T. E. Buckley). 



Adult female. Differs in having the forehead, front of crown, sides of 

 head and the throat golden yellow like the breast, thighs and under tail- 

 coverts ; hinder crown and back of the neck uniform olive yellow like the 

 entire back. Wing 2-15. 2 , 2. 2. 72, Cape Coast (Shelley). 



Young. Similar to the female, but slightly duller, and the abdomen 

 paler ; bill, with the upper mandible pale horn and the under one white. 

 (Sjostedt.) 



The Palm Slender-billed Weaver ranges from the Gold 

 Coast to the Congo. 



The name of this species was, I believe, entered by accident 

 in Dr. P. Kendall's list of Gambian birds, and it has not other- 

 wise been recorded from further north than the Gold Coast. 



In the British Museum it is represented from Ashantee, 

 Fantee, Volta River, Niger, Gaboon and Landana. 



When I was on the Gold Coast I found the species well 

 known there as the Palm-birds, and the nests, I believe, of this 

 species were suspended from beneath the leaves of the cocoa- 

 nut palms, as many as four or five hanging from one fi'ond. 

 These nests were oval with a short entrance passage and were 

 slenderly but strongly built, apparently of shreds of the palm- 

 leaves, and were of a pale brownish buff, so they may have 

 been built the previous year. We found the males in February 

 and March in full plumage, but never saw them in the act 

 of building. Ussher during his expedition up the Volta River 

 found them tolerably common in small flocks. Yet the species 

 is not included in Mr. Boyd Alexander's collection from the 

 Gold Coast, nor is it mentioned in any of the collections from 

 Togoland. 



Jardine received the species from Old Calabar, Marche met 

 with it at Bonny, Dr. Ansorge in this district, and Forbes 



