NOVlTATBS ZOOLOGICAB XXiX. 1922. 411 



I do not think that Simon's suggestion that Zodalia thaumasta Oberh. is a 

 synonym of C furpureicauda can be correct. Granted that the type of the 

 latter is not fully adult, how could its wing measure 71 mm. and that of Z. 

 thaumasta only 62, while the tail measures 77 and that of purpureicavda only 

 55 mm. The tail is certainly fuU grown and there is evidently no intermediate' 

 stage of any Humming Bird with a longer wing and shorter tail than in adult 

 birds. 



The type is undoubtedly a Bogota skin and must have been collected in 

 some part of Colombia. Bogota collectors never went beyond thfe boundaries 

 of Colombia, as shown by the species which occurred in these collections, with 

 which, however,' Chapman and other modern ornithologists are not famihar, 

 though they were of great importance before the systematic exploration of 

 Colombia by the American Museum of Natural History, as almost the oiily 

 source whence we in Europe learned anything about the Colombian avifauna, 

 and because out of these collections — ^without exact locahty, dates, and all 

 other notes as they were — ^the majority of species known from Colombia were 

 described. In fact, we know for certain that most of these collections were 

 made on the savanna of Bogota, but the collectors also entered the Magdalena 

 and Cauca valleys, and descended into the eastern plains of the Rio Meta and 

 probably other rivers. The type of Zodalia thaumasta came from the slopes of 

 the Volcano Cotopaxi in Ecuador, and if that bird is (as Goodfellow was told 

 and believed) confined to the one valley of Chillo near the Cotopaxi, Colombian 

 collectors could not have shot it, for if they had been to the Cotopaxi the collec- 

 tion in which the type of M. purpureicauda was found would have contained 

 many other Ecuadorian forms, which was not the case. This is of coiu-se not a 

 proof, but another reason for which I doubt if Zodalia thaumasta can be the 

 same as Metallura purpureicauda, but why I do not accept it is the discrepancy 

 in the descriptions, and not the theory of the restricted area of Z. thaumasta, 

 which may be correct or incorrect. 



1178. Chalcostigma ruficeps aureofastigatum Hart. = Metallura ruficeps 



aureofastigatum. 



Chalcostigma ruficeps aureofastigatum Hartert, Nov. Zool. vi. p. 74 (1899 — ^Loja, E, Ecuador). 



Tjrpe : c? ad., Loja. O. T. Baron leg. 



1179. Cyanolesbia beriepschi Hart. = Cyanolesbia hingi berlepschi. 



Cyanolesbia berlepschi Hartert, Bull. Orn. Club, viii. p. 16 (1898 — State of Cumana, N.E. Vene- 

 zuela). 



Types: (J$ ad.. Forest of Los Pahnales, State of Cumana, 25. ii. 1898. 

 Caracciolo leg. for Andre. No. 542. 



I think aU forms of the genus Cyanolesbia (or Lesbia according to Simon) 

 should be looked upon as subspecies of G. kingi (which name must be used instead 

 of cyanura, the latter being preoccupied), as it seems that only one occurs in 

 any given locahty. 



I am amused at the remark of Chapman, Distrib. Bird-life Colombia, p. 307, 

 that I treated C. caudata as a subspecies of C. kingi, though among a hundred 

 adult males not one showed " even an indication of a blue spot on the throat." 



