Vol. xiii.] 32 



Reichenow in the ' Ornithologische Monatsberichte/ ix. 

 pp. 185-186 (1901), and the author advanced the theory 

 that it was most likely a hybrid between Seleucides ignota 

 and a species of Paradisea, but provisionally gave it the 

 name of Paradisea mirabilis. After an examination of 

 the type-specimen, Mr. Hartert and I agreed that even 

 if it were a hybrid it could not have had Seleucides as one 

 of its parents. When further examining it we found 

 that the two central tail-feathers were wanting. This at 

 once suggested that they might have been long, and we 

 carefully compared the bird with the drawing and original 

 description of Janthothorax bensbachi. It at once became 

 apparent that Reichenow's supposed hybrid is nothing more 

 nor less than a second species of the genus Janthothorax, 

 and it evidently represents J. bensbachi of the Arfak Region 

 in German New Guinea. It is distinguished from J. bens- 

 bachi at first sight by its whitish-brown or brownish-white 

 and longer flank-plumes, instead of earthy- or sooty-brown 

 ones, and by the head, neck, and upper breast being of a 

 beautiful metallic steel-bluish purple instead of bluish 

 coppery-green. The central tail-feathers being absent (a 

 fact entirely overlooked by Professor Reichenow, who 

 expressly states that the tail-feathers are not elongated 

 and thread-like), I cannot describe them, but, from the 

 other differences noted above, they probably were steel- 

 blue or purple, not green as in J. bensbachi. 



(i The mixture of brown on the wings, back, and rump, 

 which evidently, from its apparent irregularity, first suggested 

 to Professor Reichenow the idea of hybridity, is shared by 

 both species of Janthothorax with Lamprothorax wilhelmince, 

 Meyer, and is neither a sign of youth nor of hybridism. 

 Professor Reichenow's error can only be explained by the 

 supposition that he was unfamiliar with the appearance of 

 Janthothorax bensbachi." 



Mr. Edwin S. Montagu exhibited specimens of varieties 

 of the Jackdaw and Sparrow. 



