252 TKOCHILTD^. 



the French Consul-General at Carthagena, M. Barrot, after its discoverer. Gould then 

 described a male from Popayan as H. purpureiceps, supposing it to differ from H. barroti, 

 which he recognized in a specimen from Veragua sent him by Warszewiez. The Popayan 

 bird, he stated, had a shorter tail and greater extension over the nape of the blue 

 colour of the crown than the bird from Veragua. The former character is due to the 

 age of the bird, the latter to the make up of the skin. The Veragua bird was figured 

 in the ' Monograph of the Trochilidge ' as //. barroti. Females from Ecuador were 

 associated with H. purpureiceps. Gould, subsequently, in his ' Introduction to the 

 Trochilidee,' changed his view and placed //. purpureiceps as a synonym of H. barroti, 

 and supposing the Veragua bird to have come from Carthagena (the original locality 

 of H. barroti !), gave it a new name, E. violifrons. We do not see any ground what- 

 ever for supposing that more than one very constant species of this blue-headed form 

 of Ileliothrix exists. The way the feathers of the head are arranged when the skin is 

 made up fully accounts for the apparent difference in the extension of that colour on 

 the crown ; and as regards the length of the tail of the male, we find considerable 

 variation exists, due, we believe, entirely to the age of the birds compared. The sexual 

 difference in the length of the tail is very obvious, and it seems nearly certain that this 

 difference becomes as it were more emphasized by the gradual shortening in successive 

 moults of the tail of the male as it advances in age. 



The range of Heliothrix barroti is now known to extend over the whole of Central 

 America, from the confines of Mexico southwards. It is not uncommon in the great 

 forest-districts of Eastern Guatemala and British Honduras, and in the former country 

 we not unfrequently met with it during visits to the low-lying hot districts. The white 

 under surface of the body and white lateral rectrices render it a conspicuous object in 

 some forest-path or in an opening by a running stream, and these features contrast 

 strikingly with the dark green of tlie surrounding vegetation. It is, nevertheless, rather 

 a shy bird, and never seen in any numbers together. 



It seems to be wholly absent from the forests of AVestern Guatemala, but passes 

 southwards on the eastern side of the Cordillera to the State of Panama, where it occurs 

 on both sides of the main mountain-chain. Its southern extension probably reaches as 

 far as the end of the forest-region of Western Ecuador. In all cis-Andean regions, 

 throughout the valley of the Amazons and Guiana, Heliothrix auritus alone is found, 

 R. auriculatus finding a home in South-eastern Brazil. 



Taczanowski ^^ tells us that M. Siemiradski, when at the Bridge of Chimbo in 

 Ecuador, observed a male of H. barroti bathing in a stream. The bird chose for that 

 operation a small cascade of a few inches in height, into which it plunged, returning 

 quickly and shaking itself an instant in the air a few inches above the stream. 

 Repeating this manoeuvre for about five minutes it flew away. 



