CKASPHDOIMIOUA MAGNIFICA (0. R. Gray). 



MA GN1FICENT R I FL E- BIRD. 



NKAJvliV all the indigenous birds of New Guinea are remarkable for the singularity and beauty 

 of their plumage ; and the species under consideration is no exception to the rule. The best 

 specimens have been obtained at Cape York, most of those from New Guinea having been procured 

 from the natives, who deprive it of the wings and feet in order to cook it. 



As in the Ptilorhis Victoria, the males of this species are very much more shy than the 

 females and immature birds. 



The food consists principally of insects, but in some of the stomachs which were dissected 

 there were found small round berries. 



In the breeding season, several white eggs are laid in a hollow tree. 



The male has the general plumage, deep velvety - black, slightly tinged with purple ; wings, 

 dull purplish-black, glossed with a greenish hue on the margins of the feathers ; feathers of the head, 

 small, scale-like, and of a bronzy-green ; feathers of the throat, similar in form, and of a shining 

 metallic oil-yreen, bounded below by a crescent of velvety - black, to which succeeds a narrow crescent 

 of shining yellowish-green ; under surface, purplish-black, the flank-feathers prolonged into a filamentous 

 form, and reaching beyond the extremity of the tail ; two central tail-feathers, green, the remainder 

 deep black ; feet, lead - colour. 



The female has all the upper surface brown ; wings, reddish-brown, margined with bright 

 rufous ; tail, rufous ; over each eye a superciliary stripe of bufly-white ; throat, huffy -white ; breast 

 and under surface, buff, crossed with numerous irregular bars of dark-brown. 



Habitats : New Guinea, and the north-eastern portion of Australia. 



