116 BIRDS OF TENASSERIM. 



This well-known species differs in many particulars, essen- 

 tially from all other known species of the family. The casque, 

 which extends over half or more of the upper mandible, forms 

 as it were one piece with the upper mandible — a section 

 through both being a somewhat elongated horse shoe. The 

 casque is only divided off from the upper mandible by a nar- 

 row projecting ridge beginning at the top of the orbital cavity ; 

 the front of the casque is abruptly truncated ; the whole of 

 the sides, the top of the casque, and the sides of both upper 

 and lower mandible as far as the casque extends, are deep 

 crimson ; the truncated front of the casque and the whole 

 of the upper mandible beyond the casque are a bright orange 

 yellow ; the effect produced is precisely as if the casque and 

 the upper half of the upper mandible had been filed away, 

 and a diminutive false anterior portion of the upper mandible 

 thus formed. In the lower mandible, however, the red shades 

 gradually into the orange, and looks natural, but no one I 

 think can examine a head of this species for the first time 

 without a conviction that the anterior portion of the casque 

 and upper mandible have been artificially manipulated. 



The casque and the upper portion of the upper mandible are 

 apparently quite solid, and of a texture as close as that of 

 vegetable ivory. 



Then the bird has the whole of the chin and throat and 

 neck all round, and a long triangular patch from the back 

 of the neck nearly to the rump, some two inches broad at top, 

 and narrowing as it recedes downwards, bare, and of a dull 

 dirty brick-red color. Even under the feathers, all over the 

 bird, the skin is of this same nasty dull-red color ; the tail is 

 much rounded, and the central tail feathers project in some 

 specimens that I have seen fully eighteen inches beyond the 

 other tail feathers, though in the particular specimen we 

 obtained they project only about eight inches. Altogether it 

 is a perfect nightmare of a bird. 



They always, Davison tells me, go about in pairs, and the 

 female appeared only to differ in the somewhat smaller size 

 and shorter tail, but we only obtained a male. 



The following were its dimensions : — 



Length to end of ordinary tail feathers, 43'5 ; expanse, 64'5 ; 

 tail to end of ordinary tail feathers, 18*0 ; to end of central tail 

 feathers (which are not yet fully developed and in parchment at 

 the base), 26-0 ; wing, 19*25 ; tarsus, 3*0 ; bill from gape straight 

 to point, 6*75; length of casque along its upper ridge, 30; 

 height of upper mandible and casque, 3*5 ; weight, 6'75 lbs. 



The irides were dark litharge red ; legs and feet dirty orange 

 brown ; skin of eyelids the same dirty red as the other bare 

 portions. 



