248 Zoological Society : — 



tions, we feel like Garrick in Sir Joshua's celebrated picture, and 

 hardly know whether to make choice of the tragic or the comic 

 muse in criticising them. It may therefore be as well to say no 

 more on the subject. 



PROCEEDINGS OF LEARNED SOCIETIES. 



ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



June 9, 1863.— John Gould, Esq., F.R.S., in the Chair. 



On a New Species of Parrakeet from Central Australia. 

 By John Gould, F.R.S., etc. 

 The Board of Governors of the South AustraUan Institute having 

 liberally forwarded for my inspection a selection from the ornitholo- 

 gical collection made by Mr. Frederick G. Waterhouse during Mr. 

 Stuart's late Exploratory Expedition into Central Australia, I have 

 thought the matter of sufficient interest to bring these birds under 

 the notice of the Society, the more so as it will enable me to make 

 known through our ' Proceedings ' a new and very beautiful species 

 of Parrakeet pertaining to the genus Polyteles, of which only two 

 have been hitherto known. Every ornithologist must be acquainted 

 with the elegant P. melanurus and P. Barrabandi, and I feel assured 

 that the acquisition of an additional species of this lovely form will 

 be hailed with pleasure. The specific appellation I would propose 

 for this novelty is Alexandres, in honour of that Princess who, we 

 may reasonably hope, is destined at some future time to be the queen 

 of these realms and their dependencies, of which Australia is by no 

 means the most inconspicuous. 



Polyteles Alexandra, sp. nov. 



Forehead delicate light blue ; lower part of the cheeks, chin, and 

 throat rose-pink ; head, nape, mantle, back, and scapularies olive- 

 green ; lower part of the back and rump blue, of a somewhat deeper 

 tint than that of the crown ; shoulders and wing-coverts pale yellowish 

 green ; spurious wing bluish green ; external webs of the principal 

 primaries dull blue, narrowly edged with greenish yellow, the re- 

 maining primaries olive-green, edged with greenish yellow ; under 

 wing-coverts verditer- green ; breast and abdomen olive-grey, tinged 

 with vinous ; thighs rosy red ; upper tail-coverts olive, tinged with 

 blue ; two centre tail-feathers bluish olive-green ; the two next on 

 each side olive-green on their outer webs and dark brown on the 

 inner ones ; the remaining tail-feathers tricoloured, the central por- 

 tion being black, the outer olive-grey, and the inner deep rosy red ; 

 under tail-coverts olive ; bill coral-red ; feet mealy brown. 



Total length 14 inches ; bill ^ ; wing 7 ; tail 9 ; tarsi |-. 



Habitat. Howell's Ponds, Central Australia, 16° .54' 7" S. L. 



Remark. — This is in every respect a typical Polyteles, having the 

 deUcate bill and elegantly striped tail characteristic of that form. It 



