994 Mr. BlytKs Report for December Meeting, 1842. [No. 143. 



tail-feathers on each side, with more or less of the next pair: bill and 

 part of the casque yellowish- white, having a flesh-coloured spot at the 

 base of the lower mandible, spreading on the throat, which is bare of 

 feathers except along its middle ; contiguous to this, the base of both 

 mandibles is black, extending obliquely downward and forward from 

 before the eye, also the hind-margin of the casque (in the male only), 

 and a large patch of the same occupies the anterior three-fourths of 

 the casque in old specimens, but never reaches downward to the 

 upper mandible (as in the next species): casque very large, and 

 exceedingly compressed laterally, protruding far backward over the 

 crown, and its ridge terminating in an acute angle anteriorly, being 

 prolonged considerably beyond the junction of the casque with the 

 upper mandible. Female similar but rather smaller, the bill and 

 casque proportionally not so large, there is no black on the hind-edge 

 of the latter, and the irides are also probably not crimson as in the 

 male. The young have at first no black on the incipient casque, 

 which appears and increases in quantity with the growth of the 

 latter. Entire length of an adult male nearly three feet, of which 

 the tail measures nearly fourteen inches, and the bill from gape seven 

 inches, being with the casque four inches high ; closed wing thirteen 

 inches, and alar expanse three feet and a quarter. Inhabits the 

 peninsula of India, being replaced to the eastward by the next species. 

 Raffles, indeed, includes it in his catalogue of Sumatran birds; but 

 B. albirostris has been so frequently confounded with it, that the 

 latter is perhaps here meant, the more especially as Dr. Horsfield 

 includes B. albirostris in his catalogue of the birds of Java: possibly, 

 however, both of these notices refer to the B. bicolor of Eyton, which 

 I will describe presently. 



B. violaceus of Shaw is stated to resemble Malabaricus in size and 

 plumage, except that its glosses are brighter and more iridescent, and 

 that " the base of both mandibles, as well as that of the casque, is 

 ornamented with a band of crimson, which at the base of the lower 

 mandible extends to some distance beneath the eyes, and is crossed by 

 two narrow black bars." Described and figured by Levaillant from 

 a living specimen, said to have been brought from Ceylon ; and a 

 figure of the bill and casque is given in Griffith's work (VII, plate 

 to p. 435, being doubtless copied from Levaillant), wherein the 



