BRACHONYX PYRRHONOTHA. 
scapulars ; tail slightly forked. Bill rather robust, and slightly arched ; tarsi 
moderately strong, claws short, blunt, and slightly curved.* 
The colours of the specimen figured in Le Vaillant (Ois. d’Afrique) are 
deeper and brighter than in the one here represented ; the former was 
probably a male bird, the latter, as already stated, was a female. In 
it the peculiar shining or semi-pellucid appearance of some of the variegations 
on the back and shoulders is visible, but not to the degree which is observed 
in the male bird, or in either sex of Brachonyx Apiata. The peculiarity of 
the colours referred to constitute, to a certain extent, a diagnostic character 
of this group. 
Inhabits arid districts on both coasts of the Cape Colony, but in no locality are specimens 
abundant. 
* The description of this .species is not so complete as I could wish, from the circumstance of the 
only specimen I discovered in Southern Africa having been mislaid, and in consequence the oppor- 
tunity denied me of substituting for hasty notes made at the time it was killed, characters drawn from a 
careful re-examination of the specimen. 
