140 



PURPLE-HEADED OR SCALY GRAKLE. 



Lamprotornis ptilonorhynchus, SWAINS. 



Above, glossy metallic green ; head, tail, and plumage beneath, 

 simple blue ; frontal feathers advancing and compressed 

 forwards on the bill ; shoulder and tail-covers scale-like, 

 and greenish blue. 



Le couigniop, Le VattL, Ois. d'Afrique^ ii. PI. 90, p, 163. 

 T urdus nitens ? Auctorum. 



THERE exists in the hot parts of Africa a small 

 family of birds, having the size and shape of 

 thrushes and the habits of starlings, but whose 

 plumage, totally unlike any others, is of the richest 

 metallic green and purple which it is possible to 

 conceive. M. Le Yaillant has given us an account 

 of those species inhabiting the interior of Southern 

 Africa, and we can now add two others, apparently 

 new, from the Western region. From the general 

 similarity in the changeable plumage of these birds, 

 and from our best systematic writers having over- 

 looked their true distinctions, great confusion exists 

 among the species in their catalogues. Some of 

 these errors we hope to clear up, the determining 

 those which will be now described. 



The species now under consideration is one of 

 the most splendid of these Grakles. Immense flocks 

 of them arrive at certain periods on the lower lands 



