ILLUSTRATIONS OF ORNITHOLOGY. 
PACHYCEPHALA MACRORHYNCHA, Strickland. 
“ The specimen here figured, was purchased by E. Wilson, Esq., 
from M. Ed. Verreaux, with the label — 1 Pachycephala albicol- 
laris , Amboina,’ attached. This name has, I believe, never been 
defined or published, and much confusion is caused by the objec- 
tionable practice of supplying museums with specimens which have 
these unauthenticated MS. names attached. It is not, however, 
on this ground, that I have altered the specific name invented by 
M. Yerreaux, but because the designation itself is wholly incorr'ect, 
the bird being merely white throated , and not white collared , as 
the name albico llaris would imply. Indeed, the whole arrange- 
ment of the colours so nearly agrees with the well known Pachy- 
cephala gutturalis , P. melanura , &c., of Australia, that it would 
not be easy to found an appropriate title on the coloration alone, 
and I have therefore adopted the more expressive name of macro- 
rhyncha. 
“ The discovery of a bird of the Australian genus Pachycephala, 
so far to the north as Amboina, is a very interesting circumstance, 
the more so as its peculiar form appears to furnish a clue to the 
true affinities of what has hitherto been an anomalous and puzzling 
genus. The small group of birds comprising the genera Pachy- 
cephala and Eopsaltria, has been classed quite at random by most 
previous writers, who seem to have had no idea of its real affinities, 
and have been content to place it, from some fancied resemblance, 
in the utterly remote American families, Ampelidce and Vireoince. 
The bird before us, though unquestionably a true Pachycephala, is 
distinguished by a beak considerably longer and more compressed 
than in the other species. In this respect it offers so much resem- 
blance to certain genera of Laniidce , as to leave scarcely any doubt 
that the Pachycephalince ought to stand as an Australian subfamily 
of that extensive group. This view" is confirmed by the observations 
of Mr. Gould, who has shown, that their habits are similar to those 
of the Shrikes, and who was the first to class them in that family- 
It is more especially the African subfamily of Laniidce, comprising 
Laniarius, Telophorus , &c., to which the Pachycephalince show an 
affinity ; and this relationship is indicated, not merely by the pecu- 
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