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quite a local difference between them. The Colombian bird is

larger and has more of an olive-brown shade over all the

plumage; the throat is less white than the Coca bird’s, but it has

the lower part of the abdomen and under tail coverts of a much

purer white; the bill is also a little darker. I am sorry I have

not more of their skins with me at the moment, to see if these

differences are constant or not. I often noticed them feeding on

the same bushes with the Magpie Tanagers, and they usually

frequented the bushes and low trees in the most open parts of

the clearings. One of the first of the many sounds to wake us

in the early mornings at the Coca, and often before the weird

cries of the night-birds had ceased at the approach of dawn, was

the beautiful song of the ignobilis, which came from the tops of

many bushes about the small clearing, and continued until the

daj^ grew hot.


I had some four or five of the young ones brought to me

at different times, but I never could manage to rear one of them,

although some I fed on an exclusively insect diet (chiefly spiders

and small cockroaches) ; perhaps some of the insects did not

suit them, for they all seemed to get a distaste for their food, and

died. In such a country as we were then in, where nothing was

to be had, it was always difficult to rear young birds unless they

were exclusively fruit-eaters ; and I cannot congratulate myself

on my success with the many young birds of various kinds I

tried to bring up. I cannot be certain that I came across any of

the nests of the 7 . ignobilis myself, although I believe that some

of the old and new nests I found in the orange trees near the

hut must have belonged to them.


In my last article I mentioned the Xanthura turcosa, which

we found in the cold mountain regions. We also met with

another of the species, X. incas, in the warm valleys between the

mountains on the Eastern side. It is still more beautiful than

the turcosa , because its colours are more varied and assimilate so

well together, a peculiar softness blending them all. Its total

length is twelve inches, and the top of the head and neck are

creamy-white in one light and the palest of mauves in another,

which is shaded into pale blue on the back. The sides of the

head and throat are black, but there is a broad triangular patch

of Oxford blue on each side at the gape, and a small touch of the

same colour over the eyes. The feathers on the forehead, which

grow out in a forward direction, are of a slightly more violet-

blue shade, and cover half the length of the bill. The wings

are a soft green on the upper side and yellow underneath, and



