Liberia <- 



The Hornbills are represented by at least eight species, 

 amongst which is the smallest member of this Asiatic and African 

 group, Lophoctros ciimurus^ a demure little bird, not larger than a 

 pigeon, with a bright red beak. A much more striking example 

 of this family is the long-tailed, white-crested Ortholophus 

 leucolophus. This bird is sufficiently illustrated by my coloured 

 drawing. It is, apparently, the more western species of the two 

 known forms of the genus Ortholophus. It will be noted that 

 the tips of the secondary and primary feathers of the wing are 

 not marked with white terminal spots, as is the case with the 

 larger and handsomer O. albocristatus? but that the white on 

 the ends of these feathers is either absent or limited to a very 

 narrow margin. There is also a difference in the distribution 

 of greyish white about the cheeks. Ortholophus leucolophus is 

 also slightly smaller (it would seem) than the other species. Its 

 range of distribution would appear to extend from Senegambia 

 on the west to Lagos on the east, from which point to the east- 

 wards begins and extends the range of the larger and handsomer 

 Ortholophus albocri status, which is particularly characteristic of the 

 Niger, Cameroons, and Congo. But Cassin, who appears to 

 have first described these white-crested hornbills in the early part 

 of the nineteenth century, is supposed to have collected the 

 type example of Ortholophus albocristatus at Sierra I ,eone. The 

 point requires clearing up, but it seems very probable that the 

 single specimen sent to America by Cassin, and marked Sierra 

 Leone, must have been labelled in error, and really have been 

 obtained from the regions of Lower Guinea, It, however, this 

 type, so characteristic of the Congo, can be proved to exist 

 in Sierra Leone, then the occurrence of the less specialised 

 Liberian form (without the white spots on the wings) in a 



1 In an immature female specimen of O. leucolophus^ obtained by -Mr. R. I*. 

 Currie, the throat \vas black, and the white spot appeared on the tips of the primaries, 



780 



