OF BUCEROS. 185 



any diversity of appearance. But so far as my informants can be trusted, 

 it may be presumed that the bird, above described, is a male, and tliat 

 the female bears a general resemblance to the young bird ; which I now 

 proceed to describe. 



With the parent bird, a young one was likewise taken. When 

 brought to the Residency, in the beginning of August last, it answered 

 to the following description, and was then tolerably well-grown, and 

 well-fledged. Wiry feathers of the head, neck, and body beneath, dingy 

 red : tail entirely white, save at either extremity, where there was a 

 margin of black : iris of the eye, greenish white : bill unribbed on the 

 upper mandible, and with the green tinge stronger than in the old bird's 

 bill : inner edges of the bill quite smooth and united : naked skin round 

 the eyes and base of the bill and bag beneath the chin, wanting the fine 

 colours of maturity : voice like the clucking of a brood-hen, falling now 

 and then into the shriller, but honiophonous note of the guinea-fowl : in 

 other respects, like the mature bird. Novv^, in the middle of November, 

 the changes noted below, have taken place : the bill less green, and more 

 like the mature bird's ; the first rib of the upper mandible developed : the 

 naked skin at the base of the bill and the bag beneath the chin, taking 

 rapidly the fine hues of maturity : the basal third and more of the tail, 

 black ; and the tip no longer black : the dingy red of the body beneath, 

 darkened a good deal on the thighs and vent : the voice hoarser and like 

 the mature bird's : the inner margins of the bill, still perfectly entire. 



The above particulars, how tedious soever, are yet worthy of record 

 in regard to a new and very rare species of bird. The old bird has re- 

 cently died : and the young one will, probably, not long survive him. 

 Should it do so, we shall, perhaps, be thus enabled to settle the question 



z 2 of 



