258 Mr. P. H. Gosse on two new Birds from Jamaica. 



winter visitant in Jamaica. Its manners, as far as I liave noticed 

 them, resemble those of the other Tyrants ; pursuing insects in 

 the air, and retiring to a prominent twig to eat them. I have 

 observed one attack with much clamour a John-to-whit ( Vireo- 

 sylva olivacea), on the wing. 



A figure of this species will be found in my ' Illustrations of 

 the Birds of Jamaica,' Part xiii. plate 45. 



Trochilus Maria. Length 4i~ inches; wing from flexure 2y^; 

 rictus rather more than -^q ; tarsus -^q ; middle toe -^q. Beak 

 (in a dried state) blackish brown above, buff below, with the tip 



black : irides ? ; feet black. Crown dull black, each feather 



tipped with a spangle of green and bronze, the spangles having 

 a tendency to form longitudinal rows : nape and sides of the neck 

 blackish, beset with spangles less numerous, but larger and more 

 golden than on the crown : back and shoulders of wings richly 

 bronzed with a ruddy golden hue, slightly tending to green in 

 some lights ; rump and upper tail-coverts more decidedly golden 

 green ; tail black, glossed with golden green, principally towards 

 the tips of the feathers, the uropygials having more of the me- 

 tallic lustre than the rest ; wing quills and greater coverts pur- 

 plish black, the innermost coverts and the winglet tipped with 

 golden : throat, breast and belly emerald green, not scaly, the 

 tips of the feathers only being metallic and showing the brownish 

 black bases between them : vent and under tail-coverts black. 

 The specimen appears to be an immature male. 



This specimen of a species previously unknown to me was 

 obligingly forwarded to me by my esteemed scientific friend, 

 Richard Hill, Esq. of Spanish-Town, to whom it was sefit from 

 the mountains of Manchester. It is near to Polytmus, but dif- 

 fers from it in the inferior length of its beak, and in the colours 

 of the plumage ; but being apparently young, it is impossible to 

 say what its adult condition may prove. I am happy however 

 to fortify my own judgment by that of Mr. Gould, who on my 

 showing it to him decidedly pronounced it new. 



Mr. Hill writes me concerning the specimen : " It was startled 

 from a nest in which were two young ones, and was obtained 

 by charging some of the blossoms of the mountain-pride {Spa- 

 thelia simplex) on which it was feeding, with minute doses of 

 strychnine. As soon as it sucked from one of the poisoned cha- 

 lices, it fluttered, and fell dead." — " The nest does not differ in 

 structure from those made of the drab- coloured down of the 

 Eriodendron, or of the Ochroma lagopus, with a stucco of lichens." 



Mr. Hill had at first proposed to name this species " bi-ac- 

 teatus" but afterwards substituted the feminine appellative, 

 which I have pleasure in placing at the head of this article. 

 "Doubting," he observes, "whether hracteatus was sufficiently 



