39 

 MUSCICAPA ATRICAPLLA. 



Syst. Nat. 326, 



THE PIED FLY-CATCHER, OR COLDFINCH. ^ 



PLATE XXXIX. 



J. he bill is flat at the base, ridged along the upper 

 chap. In the cock wholly black ; that of the hen 

 dusky near the base. The eyes are brown. At the 

 angles of the mouth are a few black bristles like feath- 

 ers. The forehead is white. The top of the head, 

 the upper part of the neck, and the back, are black in 

 the male bird, but of a dusky brown in the female. 

 The covert feathers of the tail have white edges and 

 tips in the male, not so in the female. 



In the bird before me, the first and second quill 

 feathers of the wing are black, with dusky edges, ex- 

 cept four of the last, which have their outer webs white. 

 The first coverts are of a dusky black on their upper 

 part, the lower part a pure white. 



The tail is black, only three feathers on each side 

 have their outer edges white almost to the tip. 



The whole underside of the bird is a pure white in 

 the male, in the female a dusky white. 



These birds are neatly figured by the late Mr. Ed- 

 wards, in his Ornithology, vol. i. pi. 30. but he 

 has made the wings much too short and crooked. 



In my birds, the wings reach within about half an 

 inch of the end of the tail. 



Frisch, in a Natural History of Birds published 

 at Berlin, has given an excellent figure of the male 

 of this species. Vol. 1. plate 24, 



