TIE INTELLECTUAL OBSERVER. 



JANUARY, 1867. 



THE BELL-BIRDS OF AMERICA. 



BY P. L. SCLATER, M.A., PH.D., F.E.S., 

 Secretary to the Zoological Society of London. 

 ( With a Coloured Plate.) 



It is only within the last few months that the Zoological 

 Society of London have succeeded in adding to their large 

 collection of living birds examples of the species belonging to 

 the great fruit-eating family of Cotingas (Cotingidce) , which 

 plays so conspicuous a part in the ornithology of Tropical 

 America. Birds that in a state of nature subsist almost entirely 

 on ripe fruit are, as might have been naturally expected, diffi- 

 cult creatures to provide for in a state of captivity, especially 

 during the voyage home, and consequently rarely reach our 

 shores alive. Recently, however, several forms belonging to 

 the different frugivorous families of the tropics of both hemis- 

 pheres have been successfully imported, and amongst them 

 examples of the Cock-of-the-rock of Guiana (Bapicola crocea), 

 and the Bell-bird of Brazil (Ghasmorhynchus nudicollis), two of 

 the most striking members of the above-mentioned family. It 

 is to the latter of these birds and its allied species, which are 

 vol. x. — NO. VI. D B 



