918 DR. A, B. MEYER ON A NEW ECLECTUS. [NoV. 29, 



hue of a colour the consultation of a plate is not satisfactory. The 

 red colour of the hack agrees rather well with that of E. cardinalis. 

 The bill of E. riedeli is weaker than those of ^. pectoralis fem. and 

 E. roratus fem., even smaller than that of ^. cardinalis. E. riedeli, 

 therefore, proves to be a well-defined species, in the same sense as 

 the other species of the genus, viz. an insular variation from one 

 and the same stock. 



Good luck having put into my hands a new species from a locality 

 which has been suspected to be the habitat of E. cornelia, I am 

 obliged to give way concerning my doubts as to the specific value 

 of the last-named bird (see ' Verhandlungen der k.-k. zool.-bot. 

 Gesellschaft zu Wien, 1874, p. 184), and now suppose that its 

 habitat will be somewhere in these eastern parts of the Malay Archi- 

 pelago. Unfortunately, only one specimen of EJ. riedeli has been 

 sent by Mr. Riedel, and no other Eclectics at all from any of the 

 dozen or more islands from which he forwarded specimens. I do 

 not suppose that E. westermanni, Bp., is the male of E. riedeli, as 

 the size of these two birds appears to differ ; but this question can 

 only be decided when actually green specimens arrive from Cera or 

 its close neighbourhood. After this discovery of a red Eclectus 

 without blue or violet on the breast, belly, and back, not in captivity, 

 but directly from the forest, I am rather inclined now to look on 

 E. westermanni also as a good species (see /. s. c). 



The island of Cera, or Cerra, or Sejrah, belongs to the Tenimber or 

 Timorlaut group, and is situated on ^the west of the larger island of 

 Timorlaut, only separated from it by a small sea-arm. The small 

 islands to the west of Timorlaut are celebrated for their tortoise- 

 shell; and therefore dealers from Amboina and Banda go there every 

 year ; Cera has about 2500 inhabitants. I mention these data, 

 which are not generally known to ornithologists, in the hope that 

 some one, travelling in the far east, may profit by them and make a 

 trip to Cera from Amboina or Banda. 



The species of Eclectics which occurs on the nearest island is E. 

 pectoralis, on Kei (about 150 miles distant from Cera, the shortest 

 distance between the Timorlaut islands and Kei being only about 90 

 miles), the female of which (^E. linncei auct.) differs most considerably 

 from E. riedeli. "We now know five forms of red Eclecti, which 

 differ from another much more than do the green males — a very 

 interesting fact, showing that, if variation occurs at all in conse- 

 quence of insular isolation, both sexes are not always liable to it in 

 the same degree. It is to be hoped that we may soon learn 

 more about E. westermanni, E. cornelia, and E. riedeli, and about 

 other links of the chain, if such still exist. The more forms known 

 the m.ore instructive appears the insular variation and the extra- 

 ordinary sexual diversity of this genus. Thanks to the researches 

 of Dr. Krukenberg of Heidelberg, we now know that the yellow pig- 

 ment (zoofulvin) which produces the green colour of the male 

 Eclecti is chemically the same as that which gives the yellow colour 

 to the under tail-coverts and the apical parts of the tail of E. roratus 

 female {E. grandis auct.), and that the red colour of the female 



