590 MR. R. B. SHARPE ON THE GENUS CEYX. [NoV. 26, 



that his is the same bird as the red-backed variety of Vosmaer's 

 Ys-vogel, and of Pallas's and Linnseus's Alcedo tridactyla. Dr. 

 Pucheran thus sums up his argument : — " However the case may 

 be, it is impossible to deny that the variety, or rather the race 

 with the baciv blue, of which Vosmaer, Linnaeus, and Pallas have 

 spoken, has been signalized as a distinct species by Gmelin, who 

 gave it the name oi Alcedo purpurea, afterwards the Ceyx purpureus 

 of Cuvier. This synonymy appears to us incontestable ; and this 

 conviction results from it, that, the two types, one with the back 

 blue and the other with the back red, having been first confounded by 

 Linnseus. and afterwards by Pallas, under the common denomination 

 of Alcedo tridactijla, and the first having been separated by Gmelin 

 {Alcedo purpurea, Gm. ; Ceyx ■purpureus, Cuv.), the name of 

 Alcedo tridactyla ought properly to fall to the second, and to 

 become a synonym of the Ceyx tridactyla of Jardine and Selby, 

 which is the same bird as Ceyx rujidorsa, Strickland. 



It was the conviction that Dr. Pucheran was right that induced 

 me to coincide in his rectification of the synonym}' of these two birds 

 in my ' Monograph.' But since the examination of Vosmaer's ori- 

 ginal work, I have had occasion to be somewhat sceptical as to the 

 value of the worthy doctor's argument. 



Vosmaer, as it appears, was not a binominalist, and nowhere 

 does he apply a Latin name to the birds he was describing in the 

 present instance. 



Then, again. Dr. Pucheran was most decidedly wrong in saying, 

 in the above-quoted sentence, that the two birds were first con- 

 founded by Linnseus, and afterwards by Pallas ; for the name of 

 the latter has a priority of two years. 



The plain solution of the difficulty seems to be that the blue-backed 

 bird is the Alcedo tridactyla of Pallas, and therefore ought to bear 

 the name. Vosmaer must be left out of the question, as he never 

 gave a scientific name to the bird at all. And the name rvfidorsa 

 must be applied to the red-backed species, Mr. Strickland's being 

 the first description of that bird. I have endeavoured to give the full 

 and correct synonymy of the two species at the end of this paper. 



I cannot reconcile the Martiii-pecheur de rile de Luron of Son- 

 nerat exactly -with any of the rufous-headed species. The descrip- 

 tions of the old authors are so erroneous in many cases that they 

 are not at all to be depended upon ; but if, as Dr. Pucheran sug- 

 gests, the bird described by him is really distinct from Ceyx rubra, 

 it can only be referable to Ceyx melanura of the Philippines ; and 

 of this species his description cau only be considered a loose and 

 inaccurate one. 



Ceyx melanura is a very excellent species, easily distinguishable by 

 the obscure hlac spots on the crown. While engaged in the study of 

 the rufous-headed Ceyc.es, my attention was attracted to a plate in 

 Prof. Reichenbach's ' Handbuch ' representing what he calls Ceyx 

 tridactyla, and I could not recognize these figures as being copies of 

 any figures in any work with which I was acquainted. They are 

 intended to represent two Bornean birds in the Dresden Museum. 



