

THE HYACINTHINE MACCAW. 



MaCROCERCVS HYACINTHIIS'l'S. ViKILL. 



This species, first described by Latham, and afterwards 

 figured by Shaw in the Leverian Museum and in his 

 Zoological Miscellany, is one of the rarest of the mag- 

 nificent group to which it belongs. It would seem that 

 Le Vaillant was unable to procure a specimen, for it is 

 not figured in his splendid work on the family ; nor 

 does any author of the present century appear to have 

 observed it, with the exception of M. Spix. In a former 

 work, the Tower Menagerie, misled, as we now con- 

 ceive, by the authority of the last-named zoologist, and 

 by the unusually fine condition of the bird which we 

 had then before us, we were induced to regard the 

 individual there figured as a distinct species. But sub- 

 sequent observation has led us to abandon this opinion ; 

 and to consider the differences there pointed out as 



