168 



BOUND-WINGED WEAVER. 



Ploceus brachypterus 9 SWAINS. 



PLATE X. 



Above olive ; beneath yellow ; head and neck fulvous orange ; 

 eye-stripe, chin, and throat black ; wings rounded, the 

 fourth quill longest. 



WE can find no figure by which this Weaver can 

 be identified with any species yet described. It 

 comes very near to the Mallmbus nigricollis of 

 Vieillot (Ois. Chant, pi. 45), but is entirely destitute 

 of the black collar on the hinder part of the neck, 

 possessed by that bird. And such is the confusion 

 that pervades the whole of the finches, even in the 

 best systems of the present day, that without a 

 species is positively figured, it is utterly impossible 

 to identify it, or even to know its modern genus. 



This species, we must therefore consider not only 

 as new, but as highly interesting, inasmuch as it is 

 an aberrant example of the genus, uniting the cha- 

 racters of Ploceus and Symplectes. If we considered 

 duly the structure of the wings, which are rounded, 

 and the inequality of the lateral toes, we should 

 place it with Symplectes; but then the strong cylin- 

 drical and thick bill, in nowise compressed, and the 

 inflection of its margins which are also very slightly 



