DOMICELLA COCCINEA. 127 



several specimens in the plantations and forests near that town ; neverthe- 

 less it is not a Celebesian species. It is a fact which I witnessed several 

 times myself during my half-year's stay in that dehghtful part of Celebes, 

 that, I may say, any number of these handsome birds were brought aUve 

 from the Sangi Islands to Manado by native sailors, traders, &c., for the 

 purpose of sale. The Sangi Islands are under the Government of Manado ; 

 and the chief trade of their inhabitants consists of cocoa-nuts, mats, hampers, 

 &c., and goes to Manado. Therefore com.munication, by small native prahus, 

 is always going on ; and there seldom arrives a boat without bringing some 

 living birds or the like *. 



" Every one must be fond of the genus Domicella (^Eos) in captivity. 

 They are not lazy or grumbling, Hke the Cockatoos, but active and agile, 

 graceful and fondling, always ready to play, and inviting their master 

 to occupy himself with them. As, therefore, on Celebes itself no ' Lory ' 

 (as the natives call them) occurs, and as the Sangi ' Lory ' is the nearest 

 (Ternate, with its Domicella riciniata, being further off), one can understand 

 why masses of them are introduced. Many of them, no doubt, escape, and 

 live in freedom (but I suppose they do not thrive very well, because one can 

 seldom find them) ; and, according to my experience, most of the specimens 

 of Domicella coccinea procured from Celebes show that they have been in 

 captivity, their tail-feathers, for instance, not being in a perfect state, and 

 so on. Nevertheless it will not be wonderful if at some future time 

 Domicella coccinea should be considered a bird which has occupied Celebes ; 

 and as the proof that it is not indigenous will be lost, I wish to record the 

 fact that it is introduced by men from the Sangi Islands. 



" Another not quite similar fact of the recent extension of the 

 geographical range of a bird was asserted by myself in the case of Tanygnathus 

 viegalorhynchus (Bodd.), a widely spread bird, from the Sangi Islands to New 

 Guinea, but which does not occur on Celebes, where we have Tanygnathus 



* I even saw a pair of Domicella coccinea on the island of Cebu (Philippine Islands), whither 

 it had been brought by a Sangi man. 



VOL. III. T 



