Kirombos, or Cuckoo-Rollers 481 



tinguished by having the oil-gland nude, the bridge (desmognathous) form of 

 palate, and functional caeca, the latter sometimes two inches long. They are 

 comprised in two well-marked subfamilies, the Leptosomatina and the Cora- 

 ciinte, or true Rollers. 



Kirombos, or Cuckoo-Rollers. The first-mentioned subfamily embraces 

 only a single genus (Leptosomus) and two closely allied species, one of which 

 inhabits Madagascar and the other the adjacent island of Great Comoro. They 

 have a moderately long, slightly curved and hooked bill, and narrow exposed 

 nostrils which open in the middle of the upper mandible and are covered by a 

 horny plate, while the loral plumes are recurved and directed forward, hiding 

 the base of the bill. The legs are rather short and stout, with the outer toe cleft 

 to the base and partly reversible, and the inner toe united to the middle one along 

 the basal joint. As showing a possible affinity with the Frogmouths (Podar- 

 gida), they have a powder-down patch on each side of the rump, a feature 

 not present in any other member of the family. Unlike the true Rollers, the sexes 

 are dissimilar in coloration, the male showing a metallic tinge on the dorsal plu- 

 mage. They are mainly arboreal in habit, frequenting the outskirts of the forests 

 and bush-covered plains, enjoying a strong, tolerably swift flight, and, like the 

 other members of the family, they frequently execute various aerial evolutions 

 on the wing. They feed on insects and small reptiles. The principal species, 

 usually known by the native name of Kirombo or Vorondreo, but also called the 

 Cuckoo-Roller (L. discolor}, is found in Madagascar and several near-by islands. 

 It is about sixteen inches long, the male being dark ashy gray on the head and 

 neck, excepting the crown, which is dull blackish plumbeous glossed with metallic 

 green, while the remainder of the upper parts are a dark iridescent green tinged 

 with copper-red, and the lower parts dark ashy gray becoming pure white on the 

 under tail-coverts; the wings and tail are blackish, glossed with steel-green 

 and copper-red, respectively. The slightly larger female is very different, being 

 rufous-brown above barred with black, excepting the crown, which is black, 

 while the back is brown, glossed with green and spotted with reddish brown, and 

 the under parts are rufous-buff, spotted with greenish black; the wings are 

 blackish gray and the tail entirely brown, becoming blackish toward the end. 

 The young birds resemble the females, but are duller in color. 



The Kirombos are rather tame birds, living mostly in small family parties 

 of ten or a dozen individuals, the males always being more numerous than the 

 females. The following account of their habits is from Grandidier: "They 

 frequently fly during the day at great altitudes, soaring like birds of prey in 

 circles above the treetops. But during the pairing season they exhibit the great- 

 est excitement when they rise from time to time obliquely into the air with 

 violent flaps of their wings, which they then half close and allow themselves to 

 descend to the treetops, to again at once ascend, and thus they continue for some 

 time, and then glide, uttering at intervals a mournful and plaintive cry, dreo-dreo, 

 at the same time puffing out their throats and erecting the feathers on their 

 heads." They are so sociable and devoted to each other that should one be 

 wounded out of a flock the others will remain close by, hovering over the disabled 



