317 



western coast of the Malay peninsula to its extremity at Singapore, it is one of the most, if not 

 actually the most common of all the Sun-birds, occurring in numbers in every garden and cocoa- 

 nut plantation, amongst the mangroves that fringe the shores, and wherever flowers are to be 

 seen. It seems to shun only the denser portions of the forests and the dense scrub jungle. 



" Both this species and A. hypogrammica, which is a true Anthreptes in all its habits, differ 

 somewhat from the more typical Sun-birds, in feeding more largely on insects and less upon 

 honey, and in making greater use of their feet and less of their wings when moving about 

 among the flowers and foliage. 



"The male of this species occasionally utters a feeble song, if its few twittering notes are 

 to be dignified by this appellation ; but it is very distinctly more of a song than the chirruping 

 of the JEthopygce. 



" This species has no non-breeding plumage ; this we can pretty confidently assert, having 

 obtained it at all seasons. 



"Male. Length 5T2 to 5-4 inches, expanse 8T2 to 8-62, tail 1-75 to 2-0, wing 2-5 to 2-75, 

 tarsus - 62 to 0-65, bill from gape - 75 to 0'8, weight 0-4 to - 5 ounce. 



" Female. Length 4-75 to 5T2 inches, expanse 7-7 to 8T2, tail 1*5 to 1-75, wing 2-37 to 2'5, 

 tarsus 0-55 to 0-62, bill from gape 07 to 0*8. 



" The colours of the soft parts are variable. The legs and feet are generally dark sap-green, 

 with the feet slightly paler, and the soles light yellowish green ; but the feet have sometimes a 

 yellowish tinge, and are sometimes orange, barely tinted with green, and with the soles a clear 

 orange ; the claws are generally green. The bill is dark horny brown, in some nearly black ; the 

 gape is orange. The irides vary most of all, equally in both sexes, and in birds killed at the same 

 season, from bright red to dark brown. Neither does this appear to be due to age, as we have 

 some clearly adult, full-plumaged, males with light-red irides." 



The description given by Sir E. Schomburgk of his Anthreptes lepida from Siam is not to be 

 recognized as belonging to this or any other known species of Sun-bird ; yet, according to 

 Mr. Gould, he did obtain A. malaccensis in Siam, and I have seen an adult male from that 

 locality in Mr. Swinhoe's collection; and from Cambodia I have examined a female in the 

 Marquis of Tweeddale's cabinet. 



It appears to be absent in Pegu ; for Mr. Oates omits it in a list of the Sun-birds of that 

 district which he has kindly sent me. Dr. Cantor collected it in Penang, where it has also been 

 procured by Mr. Swinhoe. 



Dr. Horsfield (Trans. Linn. Soc. xiii. p. 167) describes this species under the title of 

 Nectarinia javanica, from Javan specimens; and Sir S. Raffles (I. c. p. 299) refers the Sumatra 

 bird to the same species. The only specimen which I know of from the island of Madura was 

 collected there by Dr. Meyer in November 1871, and is now in the possession of the Marquis of 

 Tweeddale. It differs slightly from typical A. malaccensis in the almost entire absence of 

 maroon-brown on the greater wing-coverts and scapulars, and in the blue shade being more 

 intense in the metallic colouring of the wings and lower back ; it is also slightly more robust 

 (culmen - 65 inch, wing 2 - 55, tail T9, tarsus 65), but is not, I consider, separable as a species 

 from A. malaccensis. 



This specimen is figured, with the wings extended, in the same illustration with A. rhodolcema ; 



2g 2 



