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My good friend and fellow-worker Osbert Salvin, our best authority on Central-American 

 birds, has kindly favoured me with the subjoined notes on this species : — 



'■^Galbula melanogenia, so far as is at present known of its range, is exclusively found in 

 the forests of the eastern parts of Mexico, Guatemala, and Honduras. Its presence in the first- 

 named country has only once been noted by Boucard, who obtained a single specimen of it in 

 April at Playa Vicente (see P. Z. S. 1859, p. 387). 



" In Guatemala it is by no means an uncommon bird in Northern Vera Paz, near the Indian 

 village of Choctum, and in the forests which stretch away to the confines of Peten. It is from 

 this district that the bird-hunters of Coban obtain the specimens that come to Europe in 

 Guatemalan collections of bird-skins. This tract of country lies at an elevation of about 

 1000 to 1500 feet, and is heavily timbered with virgin forest. Mr. Godman and I were some 

 time in this district in the early months of 1862 ; but Galhula melanogenia never actually came 

 under our personal observation, though our Indian hunters not unfrequently brought us freshly 

 shot specimens. When making my way to the city of Guatemala in June 1859 I once saw this 

 Galhula in the outskirts of the village of Yzabal. It flew a short way along the road and settled 

 in the brushwood at the side, above one of the beautiful banks of the creeping fern {Gleichenia) 

 which there abounds. It remained, like a Kingfisher, almost motionless on its perch as I passed 

 near it on my way. I afterwards saw another near the village of Teleman, on the Polochic 

 river, which flows into the Lake of Yzabal. This was in the forest between Teleman and Panzos, 

 the embarking-place for canoes descending the river. This bird also started from its resting-place 

 near when I passed along the forest track, flew a short distance, and settled again. Its flight is 

 quick, but rather spasmodic, not unlike that of a Motmot or Trogon. 



" Southwards of Guatemala we find Galhula melanogenia still restricted to the forests of the 

 Atlantic side of the country. Leyland met with it near Omoa, in the republic of Honduras, and 

 G. M. Whitely near San Pedro, in the same country. In Nicaragua, too, it is also found in the 

 eastern forests, Mr. Belt having met with it near Chontales (see Ibis, 1872, p. 321). 



" In Costa Rica the numerous collectors who have worked there found it at several points 

 (Pacuar, San Carlos, and Turrialba); but here it is met with for the first time on the shores of 

 the Pacific ; for Arce sent us specimens procured at Bebedero, a village near the head of the Gulf 

 of Nicoya. In the neighbourhood of Chiriqui, on the shores of the same ocean, G. melanogenia 

 has been found by several collectors. Bridges first obtained it near David (see P. Z. S. 1856, 

 p. 139) ; and more recently skins have been not unfrequently included in collections of birds from 

 that district. Southwards of Chiriqui, however, we have no trace whatever of Galhula melanogenia, 

 as it has never been obtained in the more eastern parts of the State of Panama, nor yet on the line 

 of railway where so many large collections have been made during the past eighteen years. The 

 Jacamar of this part of the isthmus is Jacamerops grandis ; and this form, as it seems, entirely 

 supplants the more northern bird, and divides its range from that of G. ruficauda, which comes 

 up certainly as far as Santa Marta and the province of Antioquia." 



The plumage of the male G. melanogenia above is of the usual bright metallic green prevalent 

 in this group of birds, but with not so much coppery reflection as in the previous species ; the 

 wing-feathers are black, the secondaries and wing-coverts being edged with green like the back ; 

 the sides of the face and chin are black ; the throat is white, succeeded by a brilliant green breast- 



