of the Indian and Australian Regions. 4)7 



under surface pale yellow. Wings brown^ coverts olive-green, 

 and quills edged with that colour. Rectrices black, with a 

 faint blue gloss, the three outer pairs tipped with dirty white. 

 A young male putting on the perfect plumage, in my collection, 

 from Gilolo, resembles the female, but is darker in all its 

 hues ; it has already assumed a frontal patch of pure golden- 

 green. The rectrices of the young bird are still retained, and, 

 as in the adult female, the three outer pairs are tipped with 

 white. The upper tail-coverts are metallic-blue. A new bright 

 shoulder-covert or two has appeared ; and a bright metallic-blue 

 line descends from each angle of the mouth, the first indication 

 of the glistening gorget of the perfect male. I mention these 

 details, as I feel persuaded that by a study of the phases of 

 plumage the young males of the Nectariuice pass through before 

 reachmg maturity, we shall be able to predicate with some 

 certainty the relative age of each species in the world's history. 

 Even with the imperfect knowledge at our command, it may, I 

 venture to think, be safely assumed that the males of the 

 original species from which all the Sun-birds are descended were 

 plainly-coloured, like the females and young of the present time ; 

 and it can be shown, in one or two instances at least, that the 

 perfect plumage of one species represents a phase of imperfect 

 plumage in another. 



38. Anthreptes malaccensis, (Scop.), Del. Fl. et Faun. 

 Tnsub. ii. p. 90, no. 62, ex Sonn. (1786). 



Le Grimpej-eau de Malacca, Sonn., Voy. Ind. ii. p. 209, t. 116.* 

 f. 1, (S , descr. orig. 



Nectariniajavanica, Horsf., Tr. Linn. Soc. xiii. p. 167, "Java," 

 (1822), descr. orig. 



* The Grimjjerenu gris de la Chine of the next Plate (117) — Certhia 

 (jrisea, Scop, (ex Souq.), and also, but independently of Latham (ex Sonn., 

 C. tcBniata, Shaw, ex Sonn., and Dicfeum Jlavipes, Vieill., ex Sonn.), is a 

 Prinia, with ten rectrices, and agrees with Prima sonitans, Swinhoe (Ibis, 

 1860, p. 50, from "Amoy and Foochow"); and I may here mention that 

 C.jMrietimi, Lath. (Ind. Orn. i, p. 298, no. 58, 1790, founded on Sonnerat's 

 Possiynol de muraille des Tndcs, op. cit. p. 208), seems to be Phcenicura super- 

 ciliaris, Jerd. olim, the South -Indian race of Larvivora cyanea, Hodgs., 

 from which it is specifically separable. 



