The following description is from the third volume of the * Catalogue of Birds’ 
Adult male. General colour above velvety black, somewhat glossed with bronzy purple ; mantle produced 
into an elevated shield, composed of velvety black plumes, glossed under certain lights with bronze; wing- 
coverts velvety black, rather more distinctly glossed with purple than the back ; quills and tail-feathers deep 
black, glossed with steel-blue ; lores and nasal plumes forming an elevated crest of purplish-black feathers; 
crown of head, nape, and hind neck spangled with metallic steel-coloured feathers, each of which has a sub- 
terminal bar of purple ; sides of face, sides of neck, and entire throat deep coppery bronze ; on the fore 
neck and breast a pectoral shield of bright metallic green plumes, most of which have a narrow edging of 
copper; remainder of under surface purplish black. Total length 9 inches, cnlmen 1 * 15, wing "4*55, 
tail 3‘6. 
Adult female. Above deep chocolate-brown, the feathers of the top and sides of the head blackish brown ; 
over the eye a few white-spotted plumes; wing-coverts and quills blackish brown, externally reddish ; tail 
brown, externally dull rufous brown; throat white, all the feathers being black tipped with white ; rest of 
the under surface bulfy white, inclining to rufous on the flanks and under tail-coverts, the whole under 
surface barred across with dull brown ; under wing-coverts rufous, barred across with brown. Total length 
8’8 inches, culmen T05, wing 5T, tail 4, tarsus T3. 
The principal figure is of the natural size, with a reduced male and female in the distance. 
