1869.] DR. O. FINSCH ON A RARE PARROT. 127 
M. Jacquinot and Dr. Pucheran, gives no further account of the 
Lorius cardinalis (page 103), except the short notice that the 
species comes from the Solomon Islands. If I am right, the only 
specimen collected by the French naturalists of the expedition was, 
unfortunately, lost by the shipwreck of the ‘Astrolabe. When J 
was working out my Monograph of Parrots, I therefore was not 
able to give more than a description taken from the figure in the 
voyage; all my endeavours to get better information were without 
success. A new beam of hope arose when I was reading Prof. 
Rietmann’s ‘ Wanderungen in Australien und Polynesien’ (St. 
Gallen, 1868), and found mentioned in that amusing and, in many 
respects, interesting book (page 194) “shining-red Parrots,’ which 
were offered for sale by the natives of Guadalcanar during the stay of 
the traveller on that island. In the belief that these Red Parrots 
could be nothing more than Lorius cardinalis, I wrote a letter to 
Prof. Reitmann begging for more special information. In his kind 
answer the traveller was sorry to say that he was not sure whether 
these Parrots were quite red or not, not having brought home spe- 
cimens of them; so that our knowledge of the Cardinal Lory re- 
mained as imperfect as before. 
During my recent visit to London Dr, Sclater kindly showed me 
a very interesting collection of birds from the Solomon Islands, for- 
warded to him by Mr. Gerard Krefft of Sydney. This collection 
contained, besides two or three new species, most of the Parrots 
known from that group of islands, namely Plictolophus ducorpsi, 
Hombr. et Jacq., Pionias heteroclitus, Hombr. et Jacq., Domicella 
hypeenochroa, Gray (new to the Solomon Islands), and Domicella 
chlorocerca, Gould. Amongst them was a species of Lorius, which 
I, to my greatest pleasure and surprise, recognized immediately as 
the Lorius cardinalis, Hombr. et Jacq. A comparison with the 
plate shows some differences, in the specimen not being throughout 
of a brilliant scarlet, but having the upper parts decidedly brownish 
red and the feathers of the body beneath margined with pale 
orange-yellow. The latter peculiarity may be perhaps a sign of the 
Specimen not being in mature state. The brillianecy of the colours 
in general has probably lost somewhat by the specimen having been 
preserved in spirits; but in any case one may say that the coloration 
of the plate in the ‘ Voyage au Péle Sud’ is too bright and a little 
exaggerated. 
Concerning the generic position of this Parrot, it may be remarked 
that it belongs, according to coloration, along with Domicella rubra, 
Gm., D. rubiginosa, Bp., and the allied species, to the subgene ic 
division Hos of Prince Bonaparte. The shape of the bill, and the 
structure of the quills and tail-feathers, show a greater affinity to the 
so-called genus Chalcopsitta, Bp. (based upon D. scintillata and D. 
atra, Scop.), which is chiefly distinguished by a narrow, naked, black 
ring round the mandible, and more extended naked orbits. 
Before describing this scarce specimen, I must remark that there 
are a few more Parrots of a more or less uniform red plumage, all 
being nearly, or entirely, unknown. 
