Birds of Celebes: Dicaeidae. 443 



of Manado where Meyer met with it from January to July, and the hills be- 

 hind, where it was found by Dr. Guillemard at Tondano and Tomohon, over 

 2000 feet, and by Dr. Platen at Rurukan, over 3000 feet, and later in the 

 same neighbourhood by the Sarasins. In the south it is known from the coast 

 at Macassar up to 4000 ft. on Mt. Bonthain (Sarasins"!. 



The members of the genus Dicaeum, as Gates writes (Faun. Brit. Ind. Birds 

 n, 375), "frequent trees, generally at a considtrable height above the ground, 

 and feed both on insects and small berries. Their nests are beautiful structures 

 made of the finest and most delicate materials, egg-shaped, and suspended from 

 the tip of a branch". The genus is a large one; in 1885 (Cat. B. X, 10 — 48) 

 Dr. Sharp e described 47 species which range from India and South China 

 throughout the East Indies to Australia and Tasmania, and a number of new 

 species have since been found in the East Indies, where the list is still, appa- 

 rently, far from complete. Dr. Sharpe enumerates 9 species from the Asiatic 

 continent and islands off the coast, 10 — three of them found also on the 

 continent — from the Great and Lesser Sunda Islands, not counting the Celebes 

 Province where seven species are now (Nov. 1897) known, 10 from the Philip- 

 pines, 4 from the Moluccas, 14 from the Papuan Islands, and only one from 

 Australia and Tasmania. Thus, Australia is rendered highly improbable as the 

 land of origin of the genus. As a rule, few forms are found in one and the 

 same locality, seven recorded by Gates from British India, five by Everett 

 from Borneo, and five by Salvador! from New Guinea being the maximum 

 numbers. The species inhabiting the Philippines, now numbering with Sooloo 

 13, are mostly insular forms. It is very difficult to form an opinion as to their 

 value in determining former geographical conditions; minute stationary birds 

 like these have often such very restricted ranges that one is almost tempted to 

 say that the smaller the bird the narrower its range, and that if these species 

 are to be taken as a criterion for the former disposition of land and water in 

 the East Indies, then many bigger, wider-ranging birds cannot be taken into 

 account and must be held to have spread their range by flight; in point of 

 fact, however, many large birds are more local than these species of Dicaeum, 

 some of which are of wider range, two following the familiar rule of having 

 Borneo, Sumatra and S. E. Asia for their habitat. 



-f * 171. DICAEUM SULAENSE Sharpe. 

 Sula Red-throated Flower-pecker. 



a. Dicaeum celebicum partim (1) Wall, P. Z. S. 1862, 342 (Sula); (2j Piiisch, Neu Guinea 

 1S65, 163 (Sula); (3) Wal.l., Tr. Z. S. 1872, VXH, 72 (Sula). 



Dicaeum sulaense (1) Sharpe, P. Z. S. 1883, 579; (2) id., Cat. B. X, 1885, 24; (3) W. Bias., 

 Ztschi-. ges. Orn. 1885, 292; (4) Rclinw. & Sclialow, J. f. 0. 1886, 437; (5) Sharpe, 

 Ibis 1889, 428; (6) M. & Wg., Abh. Mus. Dresd. 1896, Nr. 2, p. 10. 



..Tomosi caposes", Banggai Id., Nat. Coll. 



56* 



