LICHENOPS PERSPICILLATUS. 



131. LICHENOPS PERSPICILLATUS (Gm.). 

 (SILVER-BILL TYRANT.) 



Lichenops perspicillatus, Burm. La-Plata Raise, ii. p. 457 (La Plata to 

 Mendoza) ; Scl et Salv. P. Z. S. 1868, p. 141 (Buenos Ayres) ; iid. Nomend. 

 p. 43; Hudson. P. Z.S. 1869, p. 432 (Buenos Ayres); Gibson, Ibis, 1880, 

 p. 21 (Buenos Ayres); White, P. Z. S. 1882, p. 604 (Buenos Ayres); Bar- 

 rtw?, Bull. Nutt. Orn. Cl. vol. viii. p. 141 (Entrerios, Azul). 



Description. Uniform black ; primaries pure white, with black tips and 

 bases ; fleshy ring round the eye and bill yellow, feet black : whole length 5-G 

 inches, wing 3*5, tail 2'4. Female above dark brown, with light brown edgings 

 to the feathers ; remiges chestnut, with dark-brown tips ; wing-coverts dark 

 brown with fulvous tips ; beneath fulvous white, breast with dark stria- 

 tions ; under wing-coverts fulvous ; bill yellowish, feet black. 



Hab. Southern Bolivia, S.E. Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, La Plata, 

 Chili, and Patagonia. 



Naturalists have said a great deal about the well-known Silver-bill 

 (the most important member of my "Spectacular" group), the question 

 as to whether the black and red birds are sexes or two distinct species 

 having long remained unsettled. Azara, writing in the last century, 

 under the heading Pico de Plata, rightly described the red bird as the 

 female of the black ; but, unfortunately, in another part of his work he 

 described the female again as a different species, naming it Suiriri 

 chorreado. Darwin also separated the sexes, and gave the name of 

 Lichenops erythropterus to the red-plumaged bird. The following extract 

 gives only a portion of his argument, and is interesting to read, even 

 now, when the question has been finally set at rest, as it shows how 

 much the two birds differ: "The tail of L. erythropterus is squarer 

 and contains only ten feathers instead of twelve : the wing is -f of an 

 inch shorter; and the secondaries relative to the primaries are also 

 shorter. The red colour on the primaries represents but does not 

 correspond with the white on the black feathers of L. perspicillatus ; 

 and the secondaries in the two birds are quite differently marked. In 

 L. erythropterus the third, fourth, and fifth primaries are the longest, 

 and are equal to each other; the second is only a little shorter than the 

 third. In L. perspicillatus the third is rather shorter than the fourth 

 and fifth; and the second is proportionately shorter relative to the 

 third, so that the outer part of the wing in this species is more pointed 

 than in L. erythropterus. The outer claw in the latter species is only 

 in a small degree straighter than in the former ; and this, considering 

 that L. perspicillatus is generally perched, and when on the ground can 

 only hop, and that L. erythropterus feeds there entirely, and walks, is 

 very remarkable/' 



VOL. i. K 



