286 BULLETIN 15 5, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



17.5 by 14.2, 17.5 by 14.2, 17.5 by 14.5, 17.6 by 14.4, 17.6 by 14.5, 



17.6 by 14.5, 17.6 by 14.5, 17.7 by 14.3, 17.8 by 14.0, 17.8 by 14.2, 

 17.8 by 14.4, 17.9 by 14.3, 18.4 by 15.1, 18.8 by 14.5. The last two 

 seem abnormally long. 



Abbott was told that todies bred twice each year. Kaempfer 

 reports eggs in the month of May. Cory found one nest that con- 

 tained three eggs. Danforth in 1927 collected a female at Santo 

 Domingo City June 17 containing an egg ready to be deposited. A 

 nest found July 18 on Gonave Island was in a little clay bank not 

 over eight inches in height beside a much used footpath. The tunnel 

 was only nine inches long. Salle believed that they lined the nest 

 cavity with dry herbaceous material, but in this seems to have been 

 mistaken as others say that the eggs are deposited on the earth with- 

 out protection. Vieillot's observation that the eggs are blue is also 

 an error. 13 



In Haiti the natives call this tody colibri. a name that Mr. P. 

 Rogevie of Miragoane says is correct. In the Dominican Republic 

 the bird is usually known as barrancoli. 



An adult male taken April 2 had the maxilla dusky brown, with 

 a reddish cast near the center of the culmen; mandible orange red; 

 iris grayish white ; tarsus and toes dull brown ; claws black. In the 

 Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences there is a young male in 

 juvenal dress taken at Anse a Galets, Gonave Island, July 18, 1928, 

 by John T. Emlen, jr., that has the dorsal surface plain, dull green, 

 and the lower parts white with the breast streaked heavily with 

 poorly defined markings of dusky. There is no red evident any- 

 where and only a very faint wash of yellow on the flanks. 



Birds from Gonave Island on first examination appear brighter 

 green above and whiter below than those from the mainland but on 

 examination of a large series so many individuals are found from 

 Haiti and the Dominican Republic that are exactly like those of 

 Gonave that the supposed differences disappear and lose even an 

 average character. There is much variation from light to dark in 

 shade of green and in the hue of the undersurface. Occasionally 

 specimens are strongly suffused with red on the lower parts. Gonave 

 birds are very slightly larger as the following will show : 



Birds from Haiti and the Dominican Republic — 



Males, sixteen specimens, wing 47.0-51.5 (49.0), tail 33.6-37.7 

 (35.8), culmen from base 19.0-23.2 (20.9), tarsus 13.3-15.0 (14.2) mm. 



Females, thirteen specimens, wing 45.6-52.2 (49.0), tail, 33.6-37.6 

 (35.4), culmen from base 20.4-23.6 (21.4), tarsus 13.0-15.3 (14.3) mm. 



Birds from Gonave Island — 



Males, seven specimens, wing 49.8-52.5 (50.9), tail 34.0-38.2 (36.0), 

 culmen from base 18.8-22.9 (21.1), tarsus 13.5-15.8 (14.7) mm. 



« Hist. Nat. Ois. Amer. Sept., vol. 1, 1807, p. 87. 



