PYRENESTES OSTRINUS 285 
of tail very strongly washed with crimson; in front of the forehead an 
extremely narrow line of black, and the remainder of the plumage is black, 
with a faint brown tinge on the wings. ‘Iris chestnut brown; bill blue 
black; culmen basally greyish blue; eyelids black, with pale blue grey 
median spots on each; legs dark horn colour.” Total length 5:6 inches, 
culmen 0:6, wing 2°85, tail 2:5, tarsus 0°9. 3g, 19.11.82. Shonga (W. A. 
Forbes). 
Adult female. Differs chiefly in the parts which are black in the male 
being pale chocolate brown, and also in the nape as well as the back and 
sides of the neck being brown. ‘ Iris dark yellowish carmine ; eyelids white; 
feet light horn colour” (Zeuner). Total length 4:6 inches, culmen 0:5, wing 
2:4, tail 1:9, tarsus 0°8. Gaboon (Verreaux). 
Vieillot’s Notch-billed Weaver ranges from the Gold Coast 
to Angola and the Victoria Nyanza. 
Unlike the other known species of this genus, the present 
one varies considerably in size, in the strength, and even in 
the form of the bill, and the sexes are readily distinguishable 
by the plumage, which is black in the adult males where it is 
brown in the females. To prove that none of these characters 
are of specific value is difficult, but I believe this to be a fact, 
for the following reasons: he black and the brown plumaged 
birds, which I call males and females, have apparently the 
same distribution. In the British Museum only four of the 
specimens have been sexed by their collectors, these are all 
males and in the black plumage. Of these, by far the largest 
is Forbes’s specimen from the Niger; in other males the 
measurements are: culmen 0°5 and 0°6, and the width of the 
bill varies to the same extent; wing 2°4 and 2°5; the former 
is a bird labelled “‘ Fantee (Swanzy),” and the latter ‘*‘ Gaboon 
(Verr.).” The females measure: culmen 0°5 and 0°55; wing 
2°3 and 2°65. The smaller of these is labelled “‘Gaboon (Verr. 
Sharpe Coll.),” and the larger one was procured for me by Mr. 
Kirby, on the Gold Coast near Accra. 
The species appears to be scarce, but fairly evenly dis- 
