Birds from Sierra Leone. 207 



Melocichla mentalis. 



A bird o£ the open scrub and grass lands. 



Family Turdid.e. 



Turdus pelios. 



Common in the gardens and scrub on the outskirts of 

 Freetown. It has a powerful song, some of its notes being 

 not unlike those of an English Song-Thrush. Its habits 

 are thrush-like, and it is frequently seen scratching about 

 amongst dead leaves in roadside ditches for snails. 



Aedon luscinia. 



A single specimen obtained near Freetown on 19 March, 

 1912. 



Cossypha verticalis. 



This handsome bird is more often heard than seen. It 

 has a fine song which it utters at sundown from the midst of 

 the densest thickets, and it is only during its short flights 

 from one thicket to another that one catches sight of it. 



Irides dark brown ; bill black ; legs and feet dull flesh- 

 colour. 



Cossypha cyanocampter. 



This is even more retiring than the preceding. I never 

 saw it in the open, and it was only by patient waiting in the 

 heart of a dense thicket, sometimes for half an hour or more, 

 that I was able to catch a glimpse of it. It has a very 

 distinctive song, commencing usually with a long drawn out 

 note uttered at intervals and succeeded by broken snatches 

 of melody. By sitting absolutely still and imitating these 

 notes, it was possible to attract this bird to within a few 

 yards, but even then it was difficult to see on account of the 

 density of the undergrowth and the impenetrable gloom 

 of the thickets, and at the slightest movement it takes alarm 

 and vanishes. 



It appears to be somewhat local in its distribution; I only 

 once obtained it in the neighbourhood of Freetown, though 

 at Yonnibanna, Rotifunk, and one or two other localities 

 inland I heard it pretty frequently. 



