166 



legs dark brown; iris crimson. Total length about 11 inches, culmen 19, wing 6'25, tail 5 - 3, central 

 rectrices extending l - 62 beyond the lateral ones, tarsus - 5. 



Adult Female. Resembles the male. 



Young (Shiraz) . Upper parts much darker than the adult, being dark blue-green, the feathers with rather 

 lighter margins, central rectrices scarcely longer than the lateral ones ; the frontal line wanting, and 

 the superciliary one very faintly indicated; the black cheek-stripe margined below with bluish white; 

 chin pale yellowish bun ; throat dull light russet; rest of the underparts pale blue-green, fading almost 

 to white on the centre of the abdomen. 



Widely distributed in Africa, and ranging eastward into India, the Blue-cheeked Bee-eater is 

 very rarely met with, and then only as an accidental straggler, in the countries north of the 

 Mediterranean. According to Crespon two specimens were killed in May 1832 near the mouth 

 of the Lez, in the department of Herault ; and M. Adrien Lacroix states (Cat. Ois. Pyr. Franc. 

 p. 273) that one was obtained on the 3rd of May 1859, near La Nouvelle, in Aude, and he sub- 

 sequently received one from Cette. In Italy it has been obtained at least on one occasion ; for 

 the Marquis Durazzo received a pair, shot near Genoa in 1834, and Malherbe records (Faun. 

 Orn. Sicil. p. 141) the occurrence of one, a female, shot near Palermo, in Sicily, and says that he 

 saw the specimen in question ; but both Benoit and Doderlein doubt this occurrence. Mr. C. A. 

 Wright states (Ibis, 1874, p. 237) : — " One of these rare and adventitious wanderers to Europe 

 was shot in Malta since the publication of my ' Fourth Appendix.' It was killed at the end of 

 May 1871, at the Inquisitor's Palace, by F. Camilleri, barber of the Central Hospital, out of a 

 flock; but whether of the same or of the common kind (M. apiaster) he could not say. He was 

 first attracted by its note, which was different from any he had heard before. The specimen is 

 in my collection. It is a male in spring plumage. It is the only Malta-killed specimen extant, 

 as all trace is lost of the only other example I know of, said by Schembri to have been killed 

 in September 1840." I do not find it recorded from elsewhere in Europe proper, except that 

 Dr. Kriiper says that in Greece it sometimes occurs in company with Merops apiaster. A small 

 flock was seen on the 19th April 1874 ; and four individuals out of it were shot. It was only 

 twice observed by Von Nordmann near Odessa, and is very rare in Southern Russia. I do not 

 find that it occurs in Asia Minor; but it has been obtained near Beyrout in Syria, and is very 

 rare in Palestine. Canon Tristram shot one in the Jordan valley in 1858, but did not meet with 

 it on his second visit, though Mr. Cochrane, who accompanied him, fell in with a small flock 

 near Hebron. 



In North-east Africa it is very common, and is, Captain Shelley says, the most abundant of 

 the Bee-eaters in April. It arrives, he adds, about a fortnight earlier than M. apiaster. Von 

 Heuglin writes (Orn. N.O.-Afr. i. p. 199) respecting the present species as follows: — "In the 

 latter days of March, and usually before Merops apiaster arrives, small flocks of this species 

 appear on passage in Lower Egypt, and frequent fields, gardens, and fig-plantations on the edge 

 of the desert, the dunes, or in meadows, and usually leave after a sojourn of a few days to return 

 again in hundreds in June and July, when they often collect together several hundred in a flock, 

 and are seen chiefly in the olive-gardens, and on tamarisks and acacias along the canals. In the 



