920 The American Naturalist. [November, 
below the throat. The rest of the bird is invested in more 
neutral tones—black, purple, bronze and green—lighting up 
into metallic brightness or deepening into dark, funereal vel- 
vet with every movement. 
As the superb-bird is glorious with great shoulder-crests 
waving like a duplicated fan, and a two-fold breast shield, so 
the Golden has its own peculiar mark of uniqueness in the six 
long threadlike shafts projecting, three on either side, from 
the head, and terminating in an oval web. These wire feath- 
ers are movable and can be thrust at pleasure straight out or 
thrown back upon the body. The head is still further orna- 
mented with the usual erectile feathers brushed back, as it 
were, from the beak; some gray in coloring or white shine 
like jewels or precious stones. On the sides, soft, massive 
pectoral plumes, jet black, pass beyond and over the wings, 
covering them when lowered and almost concealing the 
rounded tail as well. 
EXPLANATION OF PLATES. 
PrarE XXIX. From Brehm’s Thierreich. 
Fig. 1. Paradisea apoda. 
Fig.2.  Parotia sefilata. 
Fig. 3. Cieinnurus regius. 
Prare XXX. From Brehm’s Thierreich. 
Seleucides alba. 
PLATE XXXI. 
Paradisea raggiana Scl. from the Natural History of New Guinea. 
