WHITE-BODIED GRAKLE. 153 



and variability of the scale-like feathers of the body, 

 renders it quite a gem among birds. The colour of 

 these feathers are metallic, and all the same ; but 

 with this difference, that in some lights they appear 

 of the richest purple, and in others of the deepest 

 lilac, so as to appear almost red. Our modern sys- 

 tematists have left this bird under the old genus 

 Turdus, probably from not having seen it ; and no 

 author that we are aware of has described the fe- 

 male, which from its great dissimilarity of plumage 

 might well be taken for a different species. We 

 can vouch however for the fact, that the difference 

 is only sexual, having received both as male and 

 female ; and having seen a young male in its first 

 plumage (which is always like the mother's), but 

 having already assumed some of the more brilliant 

 plumes of its manhood. 



The form is altogether typical of the genus, and 

 exactly the same as that of the preceding species, 

 but the inner web of the quills has no indented 

 sinuosity ; the tail is very short and quite even. 



The male has the whole of the head, neck, breast, 

 back, middle tail-feathers, and the greatest part of 

 the wings, of a rich soft satiny appearance, of the 

 deepest and richest blue, glossed with purple when 

 held from the light, but which changes to a fire- 

 coloured red, resembling lake, when the bird is held 

 between the light and the spectator. This colour, 

 upon the lesser quills and the lateral tail-feathers, 

 only covers those parts which are exposed ; the rest, 

 and the whole of the primary quills, are black. From 



