181 



3. CHARMOSYNA JOSEPHINE. 



(JOSEPHINE'S LORY.) 

 [Plate LIX. Fig. 1, male ; Fig. 2, female.] 



Trichoglossus josepMn<e, Fmsch, Atti Soc. Ital. Sc. Nat. xv. p. 427, tav. 7, female (1873) ; 



Rchnw. Vogelbild. t. xxix. fig. 6 (1878-83). 

 Clarmosyna Josephines, Sharpe in Gould's B. of New Guin. vol. v. pi. xii. (1876); Salvador!, 



Orn. Pap. e Mol. i. p. 325 (1880) ; id. Cat. of Birds in Brit. Mus. xx. p. 84 (1891). 



Middle tail-feathers red, with no green at the hase. 

 Habitat. North-western New Guinea. 



This very handsome Lory was first described and named by Dr. Fiuscli in 1873. He 

 does not tell us why he named it josephince. He received the type of the species from 

 Count Ercole Turati, of Milan, and it is preserved in the celebrated museum of the brothers 

 Turati. Count Turati had obtained it from M. Laurent de Greaux, of Marseilles, who had 

 bought it in London. Dr. Pinsch suspected that the bird had come originally from New 

 Guinea, and this suspicion was curiously confirmed by the fact that he found in the Bremen 

 Museum some native head-dresses ornamented with the feathers of this species as well as of 

 C. papuensis. The origin of these head-dresses was made known to him by M. H. von 

 Rosenberg, who assured him that they were worn by natives of the interior of New Guinea. 



Dr. Sharpe quotes the following note, which he had received from Dr. Meyer : — 

 " I found this bird on my voyage to New Guinea in June 1873, on the west coast of 

 Geelvink Bay, when it was seen near the sea-shore in large flocks ; but in no other spot, 

 during my residence in the island, did I meet with it. The nearly allied C. papuensis has, 

 up to the present, only been found in the mountainous districts of New Guinea ; and perhaps 

 this smaller species represents it in the lowlands. Young birds have the breast undulated 

 with blackish and green, and in some females the black of the belly is strongly mixed with 

 olive-green. In life, the bill, feet, and hides are deep orange-red, the claws and the naked 

 part round the eye greyish black. In the stomach 1 only found juice of plants." 



The wings and interscapular region are again dark green, and almost all the rest of the 

 body is carmine-red. There are long rather dark blue feathers on the occiput, bounded behind 

 by a black band extending forwards to just behind the eye ; there is also a patch of dull blue 

 on the anterior upper tail-coverts, the posterior ones are crimson. The middle of the abdomen 

 and the thighs are purplish black. Some yellow streaks show themselves on the red flanks, 

 just above the thighs. The crimson colour interposes between the black nuchal band and 



