980 Mr. BlytJis Report for December Meeting, 1842. [No. 143. 



margined with shining green, and the secondaries and tertiaries slightly 

 with faint purple : throat, fore-neck, and breast, a light ferruginous ; 

 the rest of the under-parts bright yellow : ear-coverts amethystine, 

 passing into ruby-red on the sides of the neck, and separated from the 

 hue of the throat by a stripe of glossy purple ; bill dull black, and legs 

 appear to have been greenish. The female has the upper- parts gloss- 

 less olive-green with a tinge of grey ; breast as in the male, but 

 scarcely so bright ; and under-parts dull greenish -yellow ; alars and 

 caudals margined with aureous-green. The young resemble the female, 

 except in the more downy texture of their feathers, and the chestnut 

 colour of the fore-neck and breast is reduced to a slight tinge. Inhabits 

 the Tenasserim provinces, and appears to be common at Singapore. 



In the same range of territory Anthr. Javanica* abounds ; and in 

 the southern portion of it occurs a species which much approaches in 

 its plumage the Arachnotherce. I shall term it 



Anthr. nuchalis ; the female indicated, but not described, as A. 

 macularia, J. A. S. XI, 107. Length about five inches and a half, of 

 wing two inches and five-eighths, and tail an inch and seven-eighths ; 

 bill to frontal feathers above three-quarters of an inch, and but little 

 curved ; tarse five-eighths of an inch. General colour of the upper- 

 parts a rich dark olive-green, the tail dusky, its outer feathers succes- 

 sively more broadly margined with whitish, chiefly on their inner webs ; 

 the base of the hind-neck, and the upper tail-coverts, (of the male 

 only,) brilliant steel-blue : under-parts streaky, each feather broadly 

 marked with dark olive-green along the middle, and laterally margined 

 with pale sulphur-yellow, brightest on the belly : bill dusky horn- 

 colour ; and legs leaden-brown. Singapore. 



The two species assigned to Anthreptes in Mr. Eyton's list of a col- 

 lection from the Malay peninsula, published in P. Z. S. 1839, p. 105, 

 would seem, from the length of bill, as well as from their size, to be 

 rather referrible to Arachnothera. This group consists of Sun- birds of 

 comparatively large size and sombre greenish colouring, with a very long 

 and but moderately curved bill, and nostrils (apparently) closable at will 

 by the impending membrane. They appear, like the last, to be peculiar 

 to tropical Asia and its Archipelago, and are regarded by Mr. Hodgson 

 as the most highly typical form of the family. Such are — 

 * Certhia lepida of Latham. 



