F NOTES AND CORRECTIONS. 
4 
NOTE 
ON THE 
RECTRICES OF VIDUA PARADISEA. 
(Conrris. Orn. 1850, p. 88.) 
Axour three months after my notice of the remarkable structure 
of the submedial rectrices of Vidua paradisea was printed, 1 was 
not a little surprised to find that this peculiarity had been long since 
described and figured by that exceedingly accurate observer, Brisson. 
In his Ornithologia, vol. iii. p. 123, after describing the submedial 
Par of rectrices, he adds, “‘ Ex alveolo & quo hee ultima rectrix 
oritur, gracillimum exit filum, rectricis longitudinem feré adequans, 
cui rectricis pinnularum exteriorum apices arcté coherent.” No 
description can be more exact than this *—and in his Plate viii. fig. 1, 
he hag correctly represented the attachment of these filaments to 
the web of the feather. One might have expected that so unique a 
ae would have induced Brisson to dilate a little regarding 
RG ne he was too dry a describer to indulge in any philosophic 
elections ; and this extraordinary structural phenomenon has ap- 
parently remained unnoticed by any subsequent observers, till a 
recent examination of a series of specimens from Cordofan drew 
ny attention to it. —H. E. Strickland. 
: * . . 
fea ea description, I have inadvertently stated, that the filament adheres to one 
atiouta the inner) side of the feather. On re-examining the specimens, I find that 
I have said “ generally the outer” side, conformably with Brisson’s statement. 
n y 
the Plate (lix.) fig. 1, a is the interior and b the exterior web.—H.E.8. 
14g 
