1882.] MR. FORBES ON THE TRACHEA OF SELEUCIDES. 333 
2. Note on a Peculiarity in the Trachea of the Twelve-wired 
Bird-of-Paradise (Seleucides nigra). By W.A. Forses, 
B.A., Prosector to the Society. 
[Received March 7, 1882.] 
The death (from congestion of the lungs, with resulting heemor- 
rhage, and thickening of the walls of the intrathoracic air-cells) on 
Feb. 22nd last of the male Seleucides nigra, purchased by the 
Society on March 19, 1881', has given me the opportunity of ob- 
serving a peculiarity in the construction of its trachea of a nature 
unlike any thing of the kind yet known to me. The windpipe, for 
the greater part of its course, has the normal avian structure, the 
tracheal rings, which. are ossified and, as usual, notched both before 
and behind, being of the ordinary form, and separated by but 
narrow intervals from each other. For a space, however, of about 
1 inch above the largely developed short pair of intrinsic muscles, 
the interval comprising 8 tracheal rings, it becomes peculiarly 
modified, the tube itself becoming slightly dilated and flattened antero- 
posteriorly, whilst the tracheal rings become broader, and ossified along 
the middle of their depth, the borders only remaining cartilaginous. 
This ossified part of each ring is slightly concave, so that when 
seen laterally the cartilaginous margins project slightly from it, the 
whole ring being thus like a fluted table-napkin ring, when seen in 
section. ‘The intervals between these peculiar rings are very much 
deeper than those above, and occupied by delicate membrane only, so 
that all this part of the trachea is highly elastic. 
The sterno-tracheales are inserted just below the lowest of these 
peculiar rings, which is the last but three of those composing the 
trachea—the next two, which are very narrow, and the last, which 
is broad and bears the pessulus, being concealed from view by the 
largely developed syringeal muscles, of which there are four pairs, 
all, except the small anterior long muscle, being inserted on the ends 
of the very strong third bronchial semirings. The lateral tracheal 
muscles are weak, extending, however, nearly to the thoracic end of 
the tube. 
Nothing like the modification of the trachea here described obtains 
in any other allied form of Paradise-bird that I have been able to 
examine (including Paradisee papuana and rubra, Ptilorhis alberti, 
Phonygama gouldi, Manucodia atra, Ptilorhynchus violaceus and 
smithi) ; nor do I know any structure in other birds quite comparable 
with that now described, which is probably correlated with the very 
loud harsh note of these birds’. 
In all other respects Seleucides is, as might have been expected, 
a typical oscine Passerine. 
1 See P. Z. 8. 1881, p. 450. 
2 Mr. Wallace, speaking of this species, says (Malay Archipelago, ii. p. 254, 
London, 1869) :—‘‘It has a loud shrill ery, to be hearda long way, consisting 
of cdh, c4h, repeated five or six times in a descending scale; and at the last 
note it generally flies away.” 
